Essays on Longtermism : Present Action for the Distant Future

Abstract

Recent years have seen a flurry of interest in longtermism: roughly, the view that positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority of our time. Familiar calls to take a long-term view towards global problems such as climate change and poverty typically urge us to plan on a scale of decades or perhaps a century. By contrast, longtermism asks us to take seriously the idea that what we should do right now may depend on the effects of our actions thousands or even millions of years hence. This volume brings together leading scholars to discuss four sets of overlapping questions raised by longtermism. First, should we accept some version of longtermism? Second, to what extent can we predict and control the far future? Third, which ethical priorities are recommended by longtermism, and how revisionary are they? Finally, what implications would longtermism have for the design or reform of social, political, and legal institutions? Contributors include both supporters and critics of longtermism, and are drawn from a range of disciplines including philosophy, economics, psychology, law, political science, and mathematics, and from private industry.