comparable
Population Ethics and Different-Number-Based Imprecision
Theoria, Volume 82, Issue 2,p. 166–181,May 2016. DOI: 10.1111/theo.12094 Abstract Recently, in his Rolf Schock Prize Lecture, Derek Parfit has suggested a novel way of avoiding the Repugnant Conclusion
Basic Income
Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. Abstract The idea that states should provide a means-tested guaranteed minimum income for citizens who are unable to meet their basic needs is widely shared and
Emergent Cultural Differences in Online Communities’ Norms of Fairness
Games and Cultures, doi.org/10.1177/1555412018800650 Abstract Unpredictable social dynamics can dominate social outcomes even in carefully designed societies like online multiplayer games. According to
Moral Uncertainty
Oxford University Press Very often we're uncertain about what we ought, morally, to do. We don't know how to weigh the interests of animals against humans, how strong our duties are to improve the live
In defense of value incomparability: A reply to Dorr, Nebel, and Zuehl
Noûs Abstract Cian Dorr, Jacob Nebel, and Jake Zuehl have argued that no objects are incomparable in value. One set of arguments they offer depart from a principle they call ‘Strong Monotonicity’, which
Basic income: A tool for justice or an unfair redistribution of resources?
What does it really mean when scientists and politicians are talking about basic income? Basic income is comparable to a general and unconditional income guarantee. Such an income guarantee is based o
Artificial superintelligence and its limits: why AlphaZero cannot become a general agent
AI & Society (2020) Abstract An intelligent machine surpassing human intelligence across a wide set of skills has been proposed as a possible existential catastrophe (i.e., an event comparable in val
Artificial superintelligence and its limits: why AlphaZero cannot become a general agent
in: AI & SOCIETY AbstractAn intelligent machine surpassing human intelligence across a wide set of skills has been proposed as a possible existential catastrophe (i.e., an event comparable in valueproductivedesires, or desires that can direct behavior across multiple contexts. However, productive desires cannotsui generisbe derived from non-productive desires. Thus, even though general agency in AI could in principle be created by human agents, general agency cannot be spontaneously produced by a non-general AI agent through an endogenous process (i.e. self-improvement). In conclusion, we argue that a common AI scenario, where general agency suddenly emerges in a non-general agent AI, such as DeepMind’s superintelligent board game AI AlphaZero, is not plausible.
Completed: Children’s living conditions in a changing society. Socioeconomic and ethnic inequality
How are children affected by changes in income, educational reforms, immigration or changes in the family? Children's living conditions are examined with a focus on socioeconomic and ethnic inequalities.
Discrimination and Future Generations
In: Mosquera, J. & O. Torpman (ed.),Studies on Climate Ethics and Future Generations vol. 6. Working Paper Series 2024:10–17 Abstract In this paper, I analyse whether the present generation’s choices. This has been tentatively suggested in both legal theory and philosophy; I review such suggestions briefly in section 1. However, a more rigorous analysis – outlining the concept, relevant grounds, and wrong-making features of discrimination, and applying these to future generations – is still lacking. To address this lacuna, I propose a theory of discrimination and analyse why it might seem to apply – yet ultimately fails to apply – to the differential treatment of future generations. More specifically, I propose a definition of discrimination (section 2.1) and an account of the moral wrongness of discrimination (section 2.2). I moreover explore the connection between discrimination and theories of social (in)justice (section 2.3). I then apply this theory to the problem of differential treatment of future generations. While discrimination may occur between collectives, such as generations (section 3.1), my analysis shows that the specific temporal status of future generations is not comparable to other grounds of discrimination, such as gender or race (section 3.2). Moreover, due the non-identity problem and the problem of lack of a “community of social meaning” between generations, future generations cannot be claimed to be subjected to worse treatment by the present generation (section 3.3). Hence, their differential treatment due to the present generation’s choices does not amount to discrimination. Section 4 concludes and outlines some upshots of my analysis.