I wasn't sure who this man was, so some context to help others like me:
Denis Dutton, professor of philosophy at the
University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New
Zealand and founding editor of Arts & Letters
Daily, died of cancer on Tuesday.
Art & Letters Daily still is a great source for interesting articles on art, literature, science.
I lucked into taking a class of his while in studying in NZ. From my experience having him as a teacher for one semester while studying abroad his class was by far the best one I took while there and one of the top ones all my time in university. His approach to teaching the subject was excellent, and his no bullshit attitude took the material and discussion to another level. I only wish the system there was not setup to encourage enormous class sizes, departments got paid per student per class.