What We Owe To Future People

Author : William MacAskill
Publisher : Basic Books
Page : 423 pages
File Size : 51,6 Mb
Release : 2022-08-16
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781541618633

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What We Owe the Future by William MacAskill Pdf

An Instant New York Times Bestseller “This book will change your sense of how grand the sweep of human history could be, where you fit into it, and how much you could do to change it for the better. It's as simple, and as ambitious, as that.” —Ezra Klein An Oxford philosopher makes the case for “longtermism” — that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time. The fate of the world is in our hands. Humanity’s written history spans only five thousand years. Our yet-unwritten future could last for millions more — or it could end tomorrow. Astonishing numbers of people could lead lives of great happiness or unimaginable suffering, or never live at all, depending on what we choose to do today. In What We Owe The Future, philosopher William MacAskill argues for longtermism, that idea that positively influencing the distant future is a key moral priority of our time. From this perspective, it’s not enough to reverse climate change or avert the next pandemic. We must ensure that civilization would rebound if it collapsed; counter the end of moral progress; and prepare for a planet where the smartest beings are digital, not human. If we make wise choices today, our grandchildren’s grandchildren will thrive, knowing we did everything we could to give them a world full of justice, hope and beauty.

Author : Elizabeth Finneron-Burns
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 233 pages
File Size : 48,7 Mb
Release : 2024-01-18
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780197653258

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What We Owe to Future People by Elizabeth Finneron-Burns Pdf

What do we owe future people? Intergenerational ethics is of great philosophical and practical importance, given human beings' ability to affect not only the quality of life of future people, but also how many of them there will be (if any at all). This book develops a distinctly contractualist answer to this question--we need to justify our actions to them on grounds they could not reasonably reject. The book explores what future people could or could not reasonably reject in terms of intergenerational resource distribution, individual procreative decisions, optimal population size, and risk imposition.

Author : Minouche Shafik
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 55,8 Mb
Release : 2022-08-23
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 9780691207643

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What We Owe Each Other by Minouche Shafik Pdf

From one of the leading policy experts of our time, an urgent rethinking of how we can better support each other to thrive Whether we realize it or not, all of us participate in the social contract every day through mutual obligations among our family, community, place of work, and fellow citizens. Caring for others, paying taxes, and benefiting from public services define the social contract that supports and binds us together as a society. Today, however, our social contract has been broken by changing gender roles, technology, new models of work, aging, and the perils of climate change. Minouche Shafik takes us through stages of life we all experience—raising children, getting educated, falling ill, working, growing old—and shows how a reordering of our societies is possible. Drawing on evidence and examples from around the world, she shows how every country can provide citizens with the basics to have a decent life and be able to contribute to society. But we owe each other more than this. A more generous and inclusive society would also share more risks collectively and ask everyone to contribute for as long as they can so that everyone can fulfill their potential. What We Owe Each Other identifies the key elements of a better social contract that recognizes our interdependencies, supports and invests more in each other, and expects more of individuals in return. Powerful, hopeful, and thought-provoking, What We Owe Each Other provides practical solutions to current challenges and demonstrates how we can build a better society—together.

Author : T. M. Scanlon
Publisher : Harvard University Press
Page : 433 pages
File Size : 43,5 Mb
Release : 2000-11-15
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780674004238

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What We Owe to Each Other by T. M. Scanlon Pdf

How do we judge whether an action is morally right or wrong? If an action is wrong, what reason does that give us not to do it? Why should we give such reasons priority over our other concerns and values? In this book, T. M. Scanlon offers new answers to these questions, as they apply to the central part of morality that concerns what we owe to each other. According to his contractualist view, thinking about right and wrong is thinking about what we do in terms that could be justified to others and that they could not reasonably reject. He shows how the special authority of conclusions about right and wrong arises from the value of being related to others in this way, and he shows how familiar moral ideas such as fairness and responsibility can be understood through their role in this process of mutual justification and criticism. Scanlon bases his contractualism on a broader account of reasons, value, and individual well-being that challenges standard views about these crucial notions. He argues that desires do not provide us with reasons, that states of affairs are not the primary bearers of value, and that well-being is not as important for rational decision-making as it is commonly held to be. Scanlon is a pluralist about both moral and non-moral values. He argues that, taking this plurality of values into account, contractualism allows for most of the variability in moral requirements that relativists have claimed, while still accounting for the full force of our judgments of right and wrong.

Author : Everest Media,
Publisher : Everest Media LLC
Page : 42 pages
File Size : 48,9 Mb
Release : 2022-08-29T22:59:00Z
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9798350017151

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Summary of William MacAskill's What We Owe the Future by Everest Media, Pdf

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 Your life is made up of many lifetimes, lived consecutively. You experience cruelty and kindness from both sides. The modern era is rare, because it is the only time in your life when you experience such dramatic population growth. #2 The idea of longtermism is that positively influencing the longterm future is a key moral priority of our time. It is about taking seriously just how big the future could be and how high the stakes are in shaping it. #3 I now believe that the world’s long-run fate depends in part on the choices we make in our lifetimes. We can choose to improve the values that guide society, and we can carefully navigate the development of AI. #4 If I'm right, then we have a huge responsibility. We are a small minority compared to everyone who will come after us, but we hold the entire future in our hands. We need to build a moral worldview that takes the longterm implications of our decisions seriously.

Author : William MacAskill
Publisher : Guardian Faber Publishing
Page : 198 pages
File Size : 42,6 Mb
Release : 2015-08-04
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781783350506

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Doing Good Better by William MacAskill Pdf

A radical reassessment of how we can most effectively help others by a rising star of philosophy and leading social entrepreneur. 'A surprising and often counterintuitive look at the best ways to make a difference . . . MacAskill is that rarest of beasts: a do-gooder who uses his head more than his heart.' SUNDAY TIMES Most of us want to make a difference. We donate to charity, buy Fairtrade coffee, or try to cut down on our carbon emissions. Rarely do we know if we're really helping, and despite our best intentions, our actions can have ineffective - and sometimes downright harmful - outcomes. Confronting this problem, William MacAskill developed the concept of effective altruism, a practical, data-driven approach which shows that each of us has the power to do an astonishing amount of good, given the right information. His conclusions are often surprising; by examining the charities we give to, the goods we buy and the careers we pursue, Doing Good Better is a fascinating and original guide which shows how, through simple actions, you can improve thousands of lives - including your own. 'A data nerd after my own heart.' BILL GATES 'Required reading for anyone interested in making the world better.' STEVEN LEVITT, co-author of Freakonomics 'Effective altruism - efforts that actually help people rather than making you feel good or helping you show off - is one of the great new ideas of the 21st century. Doing Good Better is the definitive guide to this exciting new movement.' STEVEN PINKER, author of The Better Angels of Our Nature

Author : Samuel Scheffler
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 155 pages
File Size : 44,5 Mb
Release : 2018
Category : Generations
ISBN : 9780198798989

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Why Worry about Future Generations? by Samuel Scheffler Pdf

The things we do today may make life worse for future generations. But why should we care what happens to people who won't be born until after all of us are gone? Some philosophers have treated this as a question about our moral responsibilities, and have argued that we have duties of beneficence to promote the well-being of our descendants. Rather than focusing exclusively on issues of moral responsibility, Samuel Scheffler considers the broader question of why and how future generations matter to us. Although we lack a developed set of ideas about the value of human continuity, we are more invested in the fate of our descendants than we may realize. Implicit in our existing values and attachments are a variety of powerful reasons for wanting the chain of human generations to persist into the indefinite future under conditions conducive to human flourishing. This has implications for the way we think about problems like climate change. And it means that some of our strongest reasons for caring about the future of humanity depend not on our moral duty to promote the good but rather on our existing evaluative attachments and on our conservative disposition to preserve and sustain the things that we value. This form of conservatism supports rather than inhibits a concern for future generations, and it is an important component of the complex stance we take toward the temporal dimension of our lives.

Author : Elizabeth Mary Finneron-Burns
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 40,7 Mb
Release : 2015
Category : Contractarianism (Ethics)
ISBN : OCLC:974518993

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What We Owe to Future People by Elizabeth Mary Finneron-Burns Pdf

Author : Tim Mulgan
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 396 pages
File Size : 44,7 Mb
Release : 2006-01-05
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780191536038

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Future People by Tim Mulgan Pdf

What do we owe to our descendants? How do we balance their needs against our own? Tim Mulgan develops a new theory of our obligations to future generations, based on a new rule-consequentialist account of the morality of individual reproduction. He argues that the resulting theory accounts for a wide range of independently plausible intuitions - covering individual morality, intergenerational justice, and international justice. In particular, the moderate consequentialist approach is superior to its two main rivals in this area - person-affecting theories and traditional consequentialism. The former fall foul of Parfit's Non-Identity Problem, while the latter are invariably implausibly demanding. Mulgan also claims that most puzzles in contemporary value theory (such as Parfit's Repugnant Conclusion) are actually puzzles in the theory of right action, and can only be solved if we abandon strict consequentialism for a more moderate alternative. The heart of the book is the first systematic exploration of the rule-consequentialist account of the morality of individual reproduction. Mulgan demostrates that this account is superior to all available alternatives, both consequentialist and non-consequentialist. Once we recognise the intergenerational dimension, moral and political philosophy cannot be considered in isolation. The latter must be founded on the former. Rule consequentialism provides the best foundation for a theory of intergenerational justice. Future People brings together several different contemporary philosophical discussions: obligations to future generations, the morality of individual reproduction, the demands of morality, and international justice. While the focus is on developing a new account, there are also substantial discussions of alternative views, especially contract-based accounts of intergenerational justice and competing forms of consequentialism.

Author : Ben Eggleston,Dale E. Miller
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Page : 405 pages
File Size : 51,6 Mb
Release : 2014-01-30
Category : History
ISBN : 9781107020139

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The Cambridge Companion to Utilitarianism by Ben Eggleston,Dale E. Miller Pdf

This book offers a comprehensive overview of one of the most important and frequently discussed accounts of morality. It will be an important resource for all those studying moral philosophy, political philosophy, political theory and history of ideas.

Author : Derek Parfit
Publisher : OUP Oxford
Page : 560 pages
File Size : 54,7 Mb
Release : 1986-01-23
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780191622441

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Reasons and Persons by Derek Parfit Pdf

This book challenges, with several powerful arguments, some of our deepest beliefs about rationality, morality, and personal identity. The author claims that we have a false view of our own nature; that it is often rational to act against our own best interests; that most of us have moral views that are directly self-defeating; and that, when we consider future generations the conclusions will often be disturbing. He concludes that moral non-religious moral philosophy is a young subject, with a promising but unpredictable future.

Author : Milkyway Media
Publisher : Milkyway Media
Page : 27 pages
File Size : 54,8 Mb
Release : 2023-06-07
Category : Study Aids
ISBN : 8210379456XXX

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Summary of William MacAskill's What We Owe the Future by Milkyway Media Pdf

Buy now to get the main key ideas from William MacAskill's What We Owe the Future What We Owe the Future (2022) by philosopher William MacAskill explores our moral obligations towards future generations. How can we best address urgent global challenges such as climate change, poverty, and technological risks? MacAskill argues for effective altruism, advocating for long-term thinking and ethical decision-making to create a better world. Each one of us has the potential to make a difference. Those who can create the greatest impact are not extraordinary individuals, but everyday people. This is a time of remarkable change, presenting an opportune moment for a movement to advocate for the well-being of all future generations.

Author : William MacAskill,Krister Bykvist,Toby Ord
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 237 pages
File Size : 44,7 Mb
Release : 2020
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 9780198722274

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Moral Uncertainty by William MacAskill,Krister Bykvist,Toby Ord Pdf

About the bookToby Ord try to fill this gap. They argue that there are distinctive norms that govern how one ought to make decisions and defend an information-sensitive account of how to make such decisions. They do so by developing an analogy between moral uncertainty and social choice, noting that different moral views provide different amounts of information regarding our reasons for action, and arguing that the correct account of decision-making under moral uncertainty must be sensitive to that. Moral Uncertainty also tackles the problem of how to make intertheoretic comparisons, and addresses the implications of their view for metaethics and practical ethics. Very often we are uncertain about what we ought, morally, to do. We do not know how to weigh the interests of animals against humans, how strong our duties are to improve the lives of distant strangers, or how to think about the ethics of bringing new people into existence. But we still need to act. So how should we make decisions in the face of such uncertainty? Though economists and philosophers have extensively studied the issue of decision-making in the face of uncertainty about matters of fact, the question of decision-making given fundamental moral uncertainty has been neglected. In Moral Uncertainty, philosophers William MacAskill, Krister Bykvist, and Toby Ord try to fill this gap. They argue that there are distinctive norms that govern how one ought to make decisions and defend an information-sensitive account of how to make such decisions. They do so by developing an analogy between moral uncertainty and social choice, noting that different moral views provide different amounts of information regarding our reasons for action, and arguing that the correct account of decision-making under moral uncertainty must be sensitive to that. Moral Uncertainty also tackles the problem of how to make intertheoretic comparisons, and addresses the implications of their view for metaethics and practical ethics.

Author : Golnaz Hashemzadeh Bonde
Publisher : Mariner Books
Page : 213 pages
File Size : 45,8 Mb
Release : 2018
Category : Fiction
ISBN : 9781328995087

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What We Owe by Golnaz Hashemzadeh Bonde Pdf

A compressed, visceral novel about exile, dislocation, and the emotional minefields between mothers and daughters.

Author : Melinda A. Roberts,David T. Wasserman
Publisher : Springer Science & Business Media
Page : 371 pages
File Size : 54,8 Mb
Release : 2009-07-31
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781402056970

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Harming Future Persons by Melinda A. Roberts,David T. Wasserman Pdf

Melinda A. Roberts and David T. Wasserman 1 Purpose of this Collection What are our obligations with respect to persons who have not yet, and may not ever, come into existence? Few of us believe that we can wrong those whom we leave out of existence altogether—that is, merely possible persons. We may think as well that the directive to be “fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth” 1 does not hold up to close scrutiny. How can it be wrong to decline to bring ever more people into existence? At the same time, we think we are clearly ob- gated to treat future persons—persons who don’t yet but will exist—in accordance with certain stringent standards. Bringing a person into an existence that is truly awful—not worth having—can be wrong, and so can bringing a person into an existence that is worth having when we had the alternative of bringing that same person into an existence that is substantially better. We may think as well that our obligations with respect to future persons are triggered well before the point at which those persons commence their existence. We think it would be wrong, for example, to choose today to turn the Earth of the future into a miserable place even if the victims of that choice do not yet exist.