J. L. Mackie - Life

Life

John Leslie Mackie was born 25 August 1917 in Sydney, Australia. His mother, Annie Burnett Duncan, was a schoolteacher, and his father, Alexander Mackie, was professor of education at the University of Sydney as well as the principal of the Sydney Teachers College, and was influential in the educational system of New South Wales. He graduated from the University of Sydney in 1938 after studying under John Anderson, sharing the medal in philosophy with eminent jurist Harold Glass. Mackie received the Wentworth Travelling Fellowship to study Greats at Oriel College, Oxford, where he graduated with a first in 1940.

During World War II he served with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers in the Middle East and Italy. He was professor of philosophy at the University of Otago in New Zealand from 1955 to 1959 and at the University of Sydney from 1959 to 1963. In 1963, he moved to the United Kingdom, becoming the inaugural holder of the chair of philosophy in the University of York, a position he held until 1967 when he was instead elected a fellow of University College, Oxford, where he served as praelector. In 1974, he became a fellow of the British Academy.

On 12 December 1981 he died of cancer in Oxford, England.