Profile

Noburu Notomi, born in Tokyo in 1965, is Professor of Philosophy, Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology, The University of Tokyo. He served as Dean of the Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology and Dean of the Faculty of Letters from April 2023 to March 2025. He was awarded the Medal with Purple Ribbon in 2024.

He has received his B.A and M.A in Philosophy from the University of Tokyo, and his Ph.D. in Classics from the University of Cambridge in 1995. He taught at Kyushu University and Keio University before joining the University of Tokyo, and was invited to give lectures in many universities inside and outside Japan.

As the President of the International Plato Society (2007-2010), he organized the IX Symposium Platonicum, at Keio University in 2010. He had given over seventy papers at various international conferences and seminars, including the Special Session of the 2400 Anniversary of Plato’s Academy at XXIII World Congress of Philosophy (FISP, Athens, August 2013). He is currently the member of the Steering Committee of the FIPS (International Federation of Philosophical Societies), the member of the Executive Committee of the ISSS (International Society for Socratic Studies), the President of the Philosophical Association of Japan, and the President of Japanese Society for Neoplatonic Studies. He is also the chair of the Japanese Organizing Committee of the 26th World Congress of Philosophy, to be held at the University of Tokyo in 2028

He published a dozen of monographs, over a hundred articles on Ancient Philosophy in Japanese and English, and a few Japanese translations of Plato and Aristotle. His publications include The Unity of Plato’s Sophist: between the sophist and the philosopher (Cambridge University Press, 1999; Japanese version, Nagoya University Press, 2002; Catalan Translation, 2024), Who is the Sophist? (Japanese, Jinbun-shoin, 2007; Suntory Prize for Social Sciences and Humanities), and A History of Greek Philosophy (Chikuma Shobo, 2021; Watsuji Tetsuro Cultural Award). Listening to the Logos of Philosophy, collected papers in Western Classical Philosophy, Chikuma Shobo, 2025. He co-edited with Luc Brisson, Dialogue on Plato’s Politeia (Republic): selected papers from the Ninth Symposium Platonicum (Academia Verlag, 2013).

In recent years, together with several Japanese scholars, he has promoted “World Philosophy”. His major works in this field are An Introduction to World Philosophy (Chikuma Shinsho, 2024) and A History of World Philosophy (co-edited, 9 volumes, Chikuma Shinsho, 2020).

Researchmap: https://researchmap.jp/read0164177?lang=en