Podcasts · Stanford Psychology Podcast

184 - Tamar Schapiro: What Philosophy Can(not) Tell us About Children, Adults, and the Root of All Evil

18 Sep 2026 · 49 min

In this week’s episode, Julie and Adani chat with Tamar Schapiro, professor of philosophy at MIT! Tamar is interested in a wide range of things, from what it means to make good decisions in everyday life to ethical theory and the history of ethics (especially Kant and the British Moralists). We discussed Tamar’s work on why we treat children differently from adults, dig into whether and how reactivity might be the root of all evil, and close with some practical life advice based on Tamar’s own journey through philosophy and life!

Tamar’s faculty webpage: https://philosophy.mit.edu/schapiro Tamar’s recent book, Feeling Like It: a Theory of Inclination and Will: https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198862932.001.0001 Tamar’s paper, Childhood and Personhood: https://access.heinonline.com/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/arz45&i=593

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry on The Philosophy of Childhood: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/childhood/

Julie: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hengj/

Adani: https://www.adaniabutto.com Podcast Twitter: @StanfordPsyPod Podcast Substack: https://stanfordpsypod.substack.com/

Let us know what you thought of this episode, or of the podcast! :) stanfordpsychpodcast@gmail.com

Links in the notes 8

• https://philosophy.mit.edu/schapiro
• https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198862932.001.0001
• https://access.heinonline.com/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/arz45&i=593
• https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/childhood/
• https://www.linkedin.com/in/hengj/
• https://www.adaniabutto.com
• https://x.com/StanfordPsyPod
• https://substack.com/@stanfordpsypod