Sean Kelly
Sean Dorrance Kelly is an American philosopher and the Teresa G. and Ferdinand F. Martignetti Professor of Philosophy at Harvard UniversityHarvard UniversityHarvard University is a private research university in Massachusetts, established by the Massachusetts Bay Colony legislature in 1636 and named in 1639 for early benefactor John Harvard. Its principal campuses are in Cambridge and the Allston and Longwood neighborhoods of Boston. It includes Harvard College, graduate and professional schools, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Two governing boards share oversight. Alan M. Garber was president as of October 2026, and the endowment stood at $56.9 billion at the end of fiscal 2025.Open the full entry who works on phenomenology, philosophy of mind, and existentialism; he co-wrote the bestseller All Things Shining with Hubert Dreyfus and since 2024 has been dean of Arts and Humanities in Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
Contents19 sections
Key facts
1989Graduates from Brown University
Kelly earned an Sc.B. in mathematics and computer science and an M.S. in cognitive and linguistic sciences from Brown UniversityBrown UniversityBrown University is a private nonprofit research university in Providence, Rhode Island, and a member of the Ivy League. Chartered by Rhode Island's colonial legislature in 1764, it is known for its undergraduate Open Curriculum, which has no common required core. Christina H. Paxson, president since July 2012, announced on August 3, 2026, that the 2026–27 academic year would be her last in office. As of October 1, 2026, the search for Brown's 20th president remained underway.Open the full entry in 1989, and was a varsity swimmer there.[1]
1998PhD in Philosophy from UC Berkeley
He received a PhD in philosophy from the University of California, BerkeleyUniversity of California, BerkeleyThe University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) is a campus of the University of California system; the University of California was founded in 1868 through a merger of two institutions and moved to Berkeley, California, in 1873.Open the full entry, in 1998; his dissertation adviser was Hubert Dreyfus.[1][2]
1998–2006Teaches at Stanford and Princeton
He was a lecturer in philosophy and the humanities at Stanford UniversityStanford UniversityStanford University is a research university in California founded by Leland and Jane Stanford in 1885 and opened in 1891.Open the full entry in 1998–1999 and an assistant professor of philosophy at Princeton UniversityPrinceton UniversityPrinceton University is a private university and Ivy League member in Princeton, New Jersey. Chartered on October 22, 1746 as the College of New Jersey, it moved to Princeton in 1756 and adopted its present name in 1896. Undergraduate education leads to A.B. and B.S.E. degrees and emphasizes small-group discussion, independent research and residential college life. Graduate education spans the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and engineering. As of October 2026, Christopher L. Eisgruber was president. Its 2026–27 operating budget was $3.407 billion, including $342 million for undergraduate aid.Open the full entry from 1999 to 2006, during which he held a James S. McDonnell Senior Fellowship in Philosophy and the Neurosciences and received a Guggenheim Fellowship.[3]
2006Joins Harvard University
He joined Harvard University in 2006.[1]
2009–2015Chairs Harvard’s Philosophy Department
He chaired Harvard’s philosophy department from 2009 to 2015.[3]
2010Writes on Nihilism in The Stone
In 2010 he published “Navigating Past Nihilism” in The Stone, The New York Times’ philosophy forum, discussing nihilism in writers such as Franzen, Melville, T. S. Eliot, and Beckett.[4]
January 2011Publishes All Things Shining with Hubert Dreyfus
All Things Shining: Reading the Western Classics to Find Meaning in a Secular Age, co-written with Dreyfus, was published by Simon & Schuster’s Free Press imprint in January 2011 for a mass audience, aiming to counter the idea, widespread in contemporary culture, that life is meaningless.[2]
The book reads from Homer and Dante through Melville to David Foster Wallace; one review called its long reading of Moby-Dick the book’s high point but found its closing alternatives, such as sporting events as modern sacred experiences, thin.[5]
The book became a New York Times best-seller.[6]
May 2011Exchange with Garry Wills over the Book
Historian Garry Wills criticized the book in The New York Review of Books; Dreyfus and Kelly replied in a letter saying Wills had confused their views with discredited positions, and Wills answered that they had not addressed his specific charges.[7]
2013Co-Chairs Study of Declining Humanities Enrollment
In 2013 he co-chaired the working group studying the nationwide decline in humanities enrollment, and he also co-chaired the Harvard Humanities Project, which outlined a new vision for teaching the humanities at Harvard.[8]
2014Named Martignetti Professor
From 2014 he has held the Martignetti chair in philosophy.[3]
2015Chairs Harvard’s General Education Review
The Harvard College General Education review committee he chaired said in its May 2015 interim report that the program was “failing” on several fronts, with students not understanding its purpose and finding its courses too easy.[9]
On December 1, 2015, he briefed the Faculty of Arts and Sciences on proposed changes, including a new course in empirical and mathematical reasoning and support for course development and teaching fellows.[10]
April 2017Named Faculty Dean of Dunster House
In April 2017, Harvard College announced that he and his wife, also a philosophy faculty member, would become faculty deans of Dunster House; the couple have two children. Kelly said the General Education review had drawn his interest to the role of the residential Houses in education.[11]
February 2019Argues AI Cannot Be an Artist
In February 2019, he published an essay in MIT Technology Review arguing that AI might produce a fine Bach cantata or Go strategy but will never be an “autonomous creative agent,” because human creativity depends on our valuing it as such.[12]
2021Named Harvard College Professor
In 2021 he was named a Harvard College Professor for excellence in undergraduate teaching, Harvard’s highest undergraduate teaching honor.[6]
September 30, 2021Appears on the Lex Fridman Podcast
On September 30, 2021, Kelly appeared on episode #227 of the Lex FridmanLex FridmanLex Fridman is a Soviet-born, US-raised computer scientist and podcast host who works as an MIT research scientist on human-AI interaction and autonomous driving. His Lex Fridman Podcast is known for hours-long conversations with guests including heads of state and technology leaders.Open the full entry Podcast; the outline lists topics including existentialism, Nietzsche and nihilism, Dostoevsky, Camus, Heidegger, Hubert Dreyfus, Moby Dick, David Foster Wallace, and whether AI can make art.[13]
April 17, 2024Appointed Dean of Arts and Humanities
On April 17, 2024, Faculty of Arts and Sciences dean Hopi Hoekstra announced his appointment as dean of Arts and Humanities, effective July 1, succeeding Robin Kelsey; Hoekstra noted he was the first Harvard philosopher since William James to have had a psychology lab.[8]
Kelly said: “I think that the arts and humanities are the soul of higher education.”[6]
July 2025His Committee Issues Recommendations on Winthrop House
In July 2025 the committee Kelly chaired finished reviewing a petition to rename Winthrop House, recommending keeping “Winthrop” while dropping “John” and adding historical context; President Alan Garber and Hoekstra accepted the recommendations, and the student coalition behind the petition said it was disappointed.[14]
Related Organizations, Websites, and Public Accounts
Personal website: Public link: https://sdkelly.scholars.harvard.edu/ (opens in a new window)[15]
X: Public account: https://x.com/sean_d_kelly (opens in a new window)[13]
Harvard University: Official website: https://www.harvard.edu/ (opens in a new window)[14]
Sources
- New faculty deans for Harvard College’s Dunster, Mather Houses — Harvard Gazette (opens in a new window)
- Philosophy in the Age of New Media | The Harvard Crimson (opens in a new window)
- Sean Dorrance Kelly (opens in a new window)
- “The 20th century saw an onslaught of literary depictions of the nihilistic state.” - The Rumpus (opens in a new window)
- Featured: ALL THINGS SHINING by Dreyfus and Kelly [Vol. 4, #7] - The Englewood Review of Books (opens in a new window)
- Sean Kelly named dean of Arts & Humanities — Harvard Gazette (opens in a new window)
- ‘All Things Shining’: An Exchange | Hubert Dreyfus, Sean Dorrance Kelly, Garry Wills | The New York Review of Books (opens in a new window)
- Sean Kelly Named New Dean of Harvard Arts and Humanities | Harvard Magazine (opens in a new window)
- Committee Will Present Draft Gen Ed Proposal This Month | The Harvard Crimson (opens in a new window)
- Curriculum overhaul at Harvard College | Harvard Magazine (opens in a new window)
- College Announces New Mather, Dunster Faculty Deans | The Harvard Crimson (opens in a new window)
- Philosopher: AI Can Never Create True Art (opens in a new window)
- #227 - Sean Kelly: Existentialism, Nihilism, and the Search for Meaning | Lex Fridman Podcast (opens in a new window)
- Winthrop House Will Keep Name but Lose Its Association With John Winthrop, Thought To Be a Slaveowner | The Harvard Crimson (opens in a new window)
- A Philosopher Argues that an AI Can Never be an Artist | Sean D. Kelly (opens in a new window)