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L. W. Sumner

Canadian philosopher

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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJun 23, 2026
Entity authorityQ6456687
Source-derived summary

Leonard Wayne Sumner (born 18 May 1941) is a Canadian philosopher notable for his work on normative and applied ethics, political philosophy, and the philosophy of law.

Sumner is University Professor Emeritus of Law and Philosophy at the University of Toronto.

Education and career

Educated at the University of Toronto Schools, Sumner received his bachelor's degree from the University of Toronto in 1962 and his doctoral degree from Princeton University in 1965, with a thesis supervised by Stuart Hampshire and Joel Feinberg.

Since 2002, he has been a University Professor, the highest academic honour that the university accords its faculty. In 1990 he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. In 2009 he was awarded the Molson Prize by the Canada Council for the Arts.

Philosophical work

Sumner is the author of four books, including Welfare, Happiness and Ethics.

Selected bibliography

Books

Sumner, L.W. (1981). Abortion and moral theory. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “L. W. Sumner” is canadian philosopher. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Sumner, Canadian and philosopher, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1941, 1962, 1965, 2002—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1941-01-01. For this dossier, Sumner, Canadian and philosopher is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “canadian philosopher” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6456687. VIAF identifies the subject as 94887582. The Library of Congress control number is n80166779. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1941, 1962, 1965 and 2002.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

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  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “L. W. Sumner”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow L. W. Sumner primary sources, L. W. Sumner archive and Sumner research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “L. W. Sumner”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from L. W. Sumner” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.