David Sobel is best known for his extensive research on well-being, and more specifically the connection between what a person values and her well-being. Are options good for us simply because we favor them, or must the options have their own value, independently of our favoring them, if they are to benefit us? Could we make some entirely pointless option, such as counting blades of grass, good for us just by liking it? If we say no, how can we explain why what we favor in matters of mere taste, such as one type of soda rather than another, is better for us when there seems nothing about either option, independently of our attitudes, that merits preferring one to the other? Sobel’s current work explores such questions.

His From Valuing to Value was published by Oxford University Press in 2016. He was a founding co-editor of annual series Oxford Studies in Political Philosophy. He has held residential fellowships at Princeton’s Rockefeller Center for Human Values, All Souls College at the University of Oxford, The Australian National University (twice), The Centre for Ethics, Philosophy, and Public Affairs at The University of St. Andrews, The University of Konstanz, The University of Leiden, and the University of Cincinnati.