Title: Justice Before Role Obligations Abstract: Many believe that agents in the justice system are morally constrained to follow certain assigned roles, understood as excluding the exercise of moral judgement: lawyers to serve the interests of their clients, judges to enforce the law as written by the legislature, and juries to assess the factual evidence ... Read more
Location: Edgecliffe G03 Title: Hume’s Account of Virtue and Its Place in the History of Ethics Abstract: Hume’s account of virtue is notoriously puzzling. On the one hand, he claims that the virtues are qualities useful or agreeable to oneself or to others. On the other, he says that they are qualities which give a pleasing ... Read more
Location: Teams (online only) Title: The Philosophy of Effective Altruism Abstract: What are the strengths and weaknesses of Effective Altruism as both a moral philosophy and practical guide to action? Is it best thought of as an optimizing approach? How important is existential risk, especially relative to maximizing economic growth? How does the new form of ... Read more
Location: Edgecliffe G03 Title: All’s Well that Ends Well? Abstract: Distinguish how well someone’s life is going at a particular point -- their momentary well-being -- from how well their life went as a whole, their lifetime well-being. How are these related? The simplest answer is that lifetime well-being is just aggregate momentary well-being. Theories that deny this are forms of holism about lifetime ... Read more
Location: Edgecliffe G03 Title: The Continuum Argument Is Invalid Abstract: Derek Parfit argues by means of something he calls a ‘continuum argument’ that a particular appealing premise in population axiology implies a conclusion that he and many others consider repugnant. He treats this as a paradox, and takes up the challenge of resolving it. He looks ... Read more