Draft:Meghan Sullivan
American philosopher
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Meghan Sullivan is an American philosopher and the Wilsey Family College Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. She serves as Director of Notre Dame's University-wide Ethics Initiative and is the founding director of the Institute for Ethics and the Common Good. Her scholarly work spans the metaphysics of time, practical ethics, and the philosophy of the good life. Sullivan is the author of Time Biases (Oxford University Press, 2018) and co-author of The Good Life Method (Penguin Press, 2022). She serves as principal investigator on over $70 million in active grants to promote scholarship and public engagement in ethics.
Background and education
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Comment: The article also contains a lot of errors with the references and code, which may be indicative of WP:LLM use. Spiderone(Talk to Spider) 13:55, 6 April 2026 (UTC)
- Comment: In accordance with the Wikimedia Foundation's Terms of Use, I disclose that I have been paid by my employer for my contributions to this article. Michaelinfantine (talk) 13:40, 6 April 2026 (UTC)
University of Oxford (B.Phil)
Rutgers University (Ph.D.)
The Good Life Method (2022)
Meghan Sullivan | |
|---|---|
| Born | United States |
| Education | University of Virginia (BA) University of Oxford (B.Phil) Rutgers University (Ph.D.) |
| Employer | University of Notre Dame |
| Known for | Time Biases (2018) The Good Life Method (2022) |
| Title | Wilsey Family College Professor of Philosophy |
| Website | ethics.nd.edu |
Sullivan completed her undergraduate education at the University of Virginia, earning a B.A. in Philosophy and Politics with Highest Distinction. She was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to study at the University of Oxford (Balliol College), where she received a B.Phil. in Philosophy. She subsequently earned her Ph.D. in Philosophy from Rutgers University.
Academic career
Sullivan holds the Wilsey Family College Professorship of Philosophy at Notre Dame, one of the university's named faculty positions. In addition to her research and teaching, she has taken on significant administrative leadership, serving as the university-wide Director of the Ethics Initiative, a role that coordinates ethics research, teaching, and programming across Notre Dame's colleges and departments.
Institute for Ethics and the Common Good
Sullivan is the founding director of Notre Dame's Institute for Ethics and the Common Good, which serves as the university's central hub for research and teaching in ethics. The Institute houses the Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., Center for Virtue Ethics and the Notre Dame–IBM Technology Ethics Lab.
The Institute supports faculty program chairs, postdoctoral fellows, Ph.D. students, and undergraduates, and administers several residential fellowship programs for faculty, nonprofit leaders, and faith leaders.
Books and scholarship
Time Biases (2018)
Sullivan's first book, Time Biases: A Theory of Rational Planning and Personal Persistence, was published by Oxford University Press in 2018. The book offers a philosophical account of how rational agents should navigate the puzzles that the passage of time poses to planning — including questions about discounting the future and memory of the past. The book was the subject of a feature in The New Yorker in 2021.[1]
The Good Life Method (2022)
Sullivan co-authored The Good Life Method: Reasoning Through the Big Questions of Everyday Life with philosopher Paul Blaschko, published by Penguin Press in 2022. The book is based on Sullivan's popular undergraduate course at Notre Dame and aims to bring philosophical tools to bear on everyday questions about how to live well.[2]
Sullivan is currently writing a book on the role of love in moral life.
Teaching
Sullivan is known for innovative undergraduate teaching. She developed the course "God and the Good Life," an introductory philosophy course offered at Notre Dame since 2016 that guides students through developing a philosophical plan for their lives. The course has enrolled thousands of Notre Dame students.[3]
Sullivan has also developed and taught interdisciplinary courses in collaboration with faculty from other departments, including courses engaging with NBC's The Good Place[4], the science fiction of Ted Chiang, and the fashion world of designer Thom Browne.[5]
Grants and current projects
Sullivan serves as principal investigator on over $70 million in active grants from foundations including the John Templeton Foundation, the Lilly Endowment, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, in support of research on ethics and human flourishing.
DELTA Network — Lilly Endowment (2025)
In December 2025, Notre Dame received a $50.8 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. — the largest ever awarded to Notre Dame by a private foundation — to support the DELTA Network: Faith-Based Ethical Formation for a World of Powerful AI.[6] Sullivan serves as principal investigator. The project is led through the Notre Dame Institute for Ethics and the Common Good.
DELTA is a Christian-inspired ethical framework standing for Dignity, Embodiment, Love, Transcendence, and Agency. The grant funds development of a shared, faith-based framework that scholars, religious leaders, tech leaders, teachers, journalists, and the broader public can use to evaluate appropriate uses of artificial intelligence, designed to be accessible to people of all faith perspectives. The project was launched at the inaugural Notre Dame Summit on AI, Faith and Human Flourishing in September 2025, following a $539,000 planning grant from Lilly Endowment in October 2024.
Love and Social Transformation — John Templeton Foundation (2025)
In June 2025, the Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., Center for Virtue Ethics received a $10 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation — the largest Templeton grant in Notre Dame's history — for a project titled Love and Social Transformation: Empowering Scholars and Social Innovators to Develop the Love Ethic.[7] Sullivan serves as principal investigator. The project brings together scholars, writers, and nonprofit leaders to advance an ethical framework grounded in the concept of love as a core component of faith traditions worldwide, and connects to Sullivan's ongoing work on the role of love in moral life.
Awards and honors
Sullivan has received several awards recognizing her teaching and service:
- Joyce Award for Teaching, University of Notre Dame (2021)
- Provost's All-Faculty Team Award, University of Notre Dame (2021)
- 40 Under 40 Award, City of South Bend, Indiana (2021)
In 2025, Sullivan joined the Board of Directors of Commonweal, a Catholic journal of opinion.
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