Helen Mary Warnock, Baroness Warnock, DBE, FBA (born 14 April 1924) is a British philosopher of morality, education and mind, and writer on existentialism.

Biography

Mary Warnock was educated at St Swithun's School, Winchester and Lady Margaret Hall (LMH), Oxford. She was made an Honorary Fellow of LMH in 1984.

From 1949 to 1966, she was a Fellow and tutor in philosophy at St Hugh's College, Oxford. Then, from 1966 to 1972 she was Headmistress at the Oxford High School for girls. She was Talbot Research Fellow at Lady Margaret Hall (1972–1976). From 1976–84, she was a Senior Research Fellow at St Hugh's College, and was made an Honorary Fellow of the College in 1985. She then became Mistress of Girton College, Cambridge (1986–89). In 2000 Warnock was a visiting professor of rhetoric at Gresham College, London.

Warnock was a member of the Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) from 1973 to 1981. She was chair of UK committee of inquiry into special education (1974–78). From 1979 to 1985, she advised the UK committee on animal experiments and from 1982 to 1984 she chaired an inquiry into human fertilisation, the Committee of Inquiry into Human Fertilisation and Embryology, whose final report is often called the Warnock report. She was created a life peer in 1985 as Baroness Warnock, of Weeke in the City of Winchester.

Warnock married Geoffrey Warnock, later Vice-Chancellor of Oxford University, in 1949. They had two sons and three daughters.

Works

As chairwoman of committees of inquiry:

• The Warnock Report (1978): Special Educational Needs. London: HMSO (report by the Committee of Enquiry into the Education of Handicapped Children and Young People)
• The Warnock Report (1984): Report of the Committee of Enquiry into Human Fertilisation and Embryology. London: HMSO
• Warnock, Mary (1978). Meeting Special Educational Needs: A brief guide by Mrs Mary Warnock to the report of the Committee of Enquiry into Education of Handicapped Children and Young People.^[1] London: HMSO

As author:

• Ethics Since 1900 , (Oxford University Press, 1960) ISBN 097536622X
• Existentialism , (Oxford Paperbacks, 1970) ISBN 0-19-888052-9
• Imagination, (1976)
• Schools of Thought, (Faber and Faber, 1977) ISBN 0-571-11161-0
• Memory, (1987)
• Imagination & Time, (Blackwell Publishers, 1994) ISBN 0-631-19019-8
• Mary Warnock: A Memoir – People and Places, (Duckworth, 2001) ISBN 0-7156-2955-7 & ISBN 0-7156-3141-1
• Making Babies: Is There a Right To Have Children?, (2001)
• The Intelligent Person's Guide to Ethics, (1998)
• Nature and Mortality: Recollections of a Philosopher in Public Life, (2004), ISBN 0-8264-7323-7
• An Intelligent Person's Guide to Ethics, (Duckworth, 2004) ISBN 0-7156-3320-1
• Easeful Death,(with Elisabeth MacDonald) (OUP, 2008)

See also

• list of Visiting Gresham Professors

Notes

External links

• Mary Warnock's Top Ten Philosophy Books
• The Practical Philosopher
• Ethics Bites interview on The Right to Have Babies