William H. Aiken Jr. (1947 – 2006)
CEPPA Fellow 1992, and 1999
By Steve Twedt, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Monday, August 21, 2006
William H. Aiken Jr., 59, a professor of philosophy and religion at Chatham College for 28 years, died of complications from cancer at his O'Hara home on July 31.
Mr. Aiken was active in the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Pittsburgh and served on their ministry committee. He also was a member of the Pittsburgh Bach Choir, the American Philosophical Society and the Ethics Committee at UPMC Shadyside.
Mr. Aiken held a bachelor's degree from Carleton College, a master's of divinity from Yale University and a doctorate in philosophy from Vanderbilt University.
Mr. Aiken is survived by his wife, Sally Aiken, and their children, Travis, Jesse and Rebecca Aiken, all of O'Hara. He is also survived by his mother, Rosemary Aiken Sittig of Charlottesville, Va., and a sister, Rosemary Call, of Woodbridge, Conn.
The family requests that memorial contributions be made to one of the following: Family Hospice and Palliative Care, 50 Moffett St., Pittsburgh 15243; Chatham Baroque Ensemble, The Ice House, No. 201, 100 43rd St., Pittsburgh 15201; or the Religious Society of Friends, 4836 Ellsworth Ave., Pittsburgh 15213.
By John Haldane
Will Aiken was a quiet, sensitive, unassuming figure, devoted to his family and to his students at Chatham College. His understanding of the nature and value of philosophy, and of the teaching of it was deeply humane. He believed that philosophical reflection was part of the ongoing effort to understand the human condition and to find within it a set of enduring values by which to live, and in terms of which to fashion social and public policies.
While aesthetic and religious sensibilities shaped his own modes of appreciation he recognised the importance of science as an investigation of the world: not only that of the microscopic and cosmological but of the humanly experienced world of nature. His own institution, Chatham College, had been the place of education of Rachel Carlson, author of Silent Spring. That book was a principal contributor to the banning of DDT, and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Aiken was likewise sensitive to the importance of respecting the natural environment. But in fashioning an environmental ethic he was also ever attendant to human needs and interests, and to that extent was a humanistic ecologist.
In addition to his own writings on environmental ethics and social justice, Will Aiken co-edited three collections of essays of which the most notable was World Hunger and Moral Obligation, co-edited with Hugh LaFollette (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1977) 2nd edition (1996). That contained a number of much discussed articles by Garret Hardin, Henry Shue, Peter Singer, and others. Later, again with Hugh LaFollette (who like Aiken was a fellow of the Centre for Philosophy and Public Affairs in St Andrews), Aiken edited Whose Child?: Children's Rights, Parental Authority, and State Power (Rowman & Littlefield, 1980), and in 2004 with John Haldane he co-edited Philosophy and its Public Role (Imprint Academic) volume two in St Andrews Studies in Philosophy and Public Affairs.
The last of these books derived from a conference of former fellows of the St Andrews Centre held in the former residence of Andrew Mellon on the campus of Chatham College, where Will had spent the major part of his career. He was a charming host and a characteristically generous commentator. He is much missed by his family, friends and former colleagues.