Professor Terjesen was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY.  After taking a college credit class in the history of philosophy in high school, he entered the State University of New York at Geneseo as a philosophy major.  He graduated in 1996 and immediately entered into the graduate program in Philosophy at Duke University, where he earned his Ph.D. in 2005.  His primary interest lies in the area of moral psychology – which explores the issues surrounding moral agency such as the role of emotions in making moral judgments, whether or not we have an innate moral sense, and the nature of weakness of will.  He is especially interested in what Scottish Enlightenment thinkers (notably David Hume and Adam Smith) have to say on this topic and whether the natural and social sciences offer any potential insights into these questions that may be of use to philosophers.  His dissertation argued for the necessity of including some form of empathy in moral judgments, but argued against the idea that empathy alone could yield reliable moral judgments.

Prior to coming to Rhodes in the Fall of 2007, Professor Terjesen taught for a year at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, VA and for three years before that at Austin College in Sherman, TX.  In the past he has taught courses in the history of philosophy, Chinese philosophy, ethics, philosophy of law, philosophy of economics, and philosophy of mind.  While at Austin College he was awarded the Outstanding Teaching Award for the Humanities for 2006.

He is very interested in the ways in which philosophy is expressed in popular culture and has taught JanTerms (one month courses at Austin College) on philosophy and comic books.  In September 2007, his essay on the ethics of humor in Family Guy will appear in Family Guy and Philosophy from Blackwell Publishing.  He has also essays in the works on philosophy and Battlestar Galactica, The Office, and dogs.