Herb Morris, UCLA School of Law, Department Philosophy, Trained Analyst: Going with Mom Friday!

This man is amazing! Just wanted to give him a plug, because he has written so much on so many different things. He is a renowned philosopher of law, who has contributed both to our understanding of moral and legal philosophy. He is emeritus both in philosophy and law at UCLA.

He is also a psychoanalyst. My God, when did this man start to work? Or perhaps he's like my brilliant friend in NYC, real life and FB both, who went to college at 14 and powered through grad programs before a political career (not elected) and business success

The philosophical work focuses on "questions of moral emotions, responsibility, punishment," and his paper "Persons and Punishment" was a game-changer in writing about that topic.

His books include two literary works: The Masked Citadel: The Significance of the Title of Stendhal's 'La Chartreuse de Parme' (1968) and Artists in Evil: An Essay on Evil and Redemption in Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time (2009). Other books include: Essays in Legal Philosophy and Moral Psychology (1976), Guilt and Shame (1971) and finally, the seminal Freedom and Responsibility: Readings in Philosophy and Law  (1961).

Mom knew him when she taught at her alma mater, UCLA Law, for one year between two government jobs. I loved it because it was the only time I saw Mom before 7 PM on weekdays and we went to get ice cream around 4 PM quite a lot. I loved that year and then she went "back to work," from my perspective, in 1981.

Professor Morris received his B.A. from UCLA,  LL.B. from Yale Law and a doctorate from Oxford. I am unclear how he can be an analyst without Ph.D in psychology, which is now sufficient as long as you go through the rigors of the analytical institutes. For a long time, only M.D.s could be psychoanalysts. Big fussing as Dad would say between two major analytic institutes in LA over this, and indeed I think an old analyst whose wife was Ph.D, told me that one group within the main analytic institute in LA broke off and formed their own so that Ph.D.s could be let in. You don't need to understand everything about the human body to be a good shrink or analyst, totally absurd. And honestly, straight shinks learn almost nothing significant in med school. If they learn anything, it's in residency. And analysis is not just about meds, obviously, it's the last bastion of elite talk therapy, though of couse , you can find a smart and articulate MFCC or Ph.D. out there , if you try  hard enough.

I cannot wait to hear Herb Morris, not sure if he and Mom were in school together. He's older , more like Dad's age but looks fabulous. If he published that big book in 1961, he has to be at least 8 or 9 yrs older than Mom, assuming he published it at 30. Mom was born in 1940 and would have been just 21 at time of publishing.