Burton Porter received his Bachelor's degree from the University of Maryland and his Ph.D. from St. Andrews University, Scotland, with graduate study at Oxford University. He has taught at various institutions such as Russell Sage College and Drexel University, and has held positions as Department Chair and Dean of Arts and Sciences. At present, he is on the faculty at Western New England University in Springfield, MA, having served as Visiting Professor at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, MA. He received the award of Outstanding Educator of America.

In addition to The Good Life, Burton Porter is the author and/or editor of numerous books and articles including The Great Perhaps (Rowman and Littlefield), What the Tortoise Taught Us (Rowman and Littlefield), Philosophy Through Film (Sloan Publishing), The Head and the Heart (Humanities Books), The Voice of Reason (Oxford University Press), Philosophy Through Fiction and Film (Prentice Hall, Sloan Publications), Religion and Reason (St. Martin's Press), Personal Philosophy (Harcourt Brace), Reasons for Living (Macmillan Publishing), Philosophy, A Literary and Conceptual Approach (Harcourt Brace), and Deity and Morality (Routledge, Allen and Unwin).

In addition to his print publications, Dr. Porter has several books on-line at Kindle and Nook including The Moebius Strip, Black Swans and White Tigers, Lab' Rats, The Gadfly, and Forbidden Knowledge - Things We Should Not Know.