Skip to content
  • Why Actions Matter: The Case for Fluid Moral Status

    This article received an honourable mention in the graduate category of the 2023 National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics Written by Lucy Simpson, Nottingham Trent University student   Throughout the catalogue of work produced by Jeff McMahan, he has discussed what constitutes a being’s moral status, and has advocated the theories of moral individualism and reflective…

    Read more

  • Do we have an Obligation to Diversify our Media Consumption ?

    This article received an honourable mention in the graduate category of the 2023 National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics Written by James Shearer, University of St Andrews student Introduction  In an increasingly politicised society, previously mundane decisions about our daily lives can take on normative qualities. One such question is “what news media should we consume?”.…

    Read more

  • Announcing the Winners and Runners Up in the 9th Annual National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics

    Please join us in congratulating all four of the finalists in the National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics 2023, and in particular our winners, Lukas Joosten and Avital Fried. We would also like to thank our judges, Prof Roger Crisp, Prof Edward Harcourt and Dr Sarah Raskoff. This, the final of the 9th Annual…

    Read more

  • Should Social Media Companies Use Artificial Intelligence to Automate Content Moderation on their Platforms and, if so, Under What Conditions?

    This article received an honourable mention in the graduate category of the 2023 National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics Written by University of Oxford student Trenton Andrew Sewell  Social Media Companies (SMCs) should use artificial intelligence (‘AI’) to automate content moderation (‘CM’) presuming they meet two kinds of conditions. Firstly, ‘End Conditions’ (‘ECs’) which restrict…

    Read more

  • Cross Post: Why Government Budgets are Exercises in Distributing Life and Death as Much as Fiscal Calculations

    Written by Hazem Zohny, University of Oxford Sacrificial dilemmas are popular among philosophers. Should you divert a train from five people strapped to the tracks to a side-track with only one person strapped to it? What if that one person were a renowned cancer researcher? What if there were only a 70% chance the five…

    Read more

  • How Confucian Harmony Can Help Us Deal with Echo Chambers

    This article received an honourable mention in the graduate category of the 2023 National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics Written by Kyle van Oosterum, University of Oxford student Section 1 – Introduction Many of us are part of or aware of the existence of widespread echo chambers on social media. Echo chambers seem concerning…

    Read more

  • Why Preventing Predation Can Be a Morally Right Cause for Effective Altruism?

    This article received an honourable mention in the graduate category of the 2023 National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics Written by University of Oxford student Pablo Neira If the interests of sentient animals matter, then there are (at least pro tanto) reasons to prevent the harms they suffer. There are many different natural harms…

    Read more

  • Eth­i­cal Bi­o­log­i­cal Nat­u­ral­ism and the Case Against Moral Sta­tus for AIs

    This article received an honourable mention in the graduate category of the 2023 National Oxford Uehiro Prize in Practical Ethics Written by University of Oxford student Samuel Iglesias   In­tro­duc­tion 6.522. “There are, in­deed, things that can­not be put into words. They make them­selves man­i­fest. They are what is mys­ti­cal”. —Lud­wig Wittgen­stein, Trac­ta­tus Logi­co Philo­soph­icus. What…

    Read more

  • Healthcare Allocation for Limited Budgets

    By Joshua Parker and Ben Davies Like many public services, the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) is under increasing resource pressure across the service. Acute services are under strain, with every stage between dialling 999 and getting into a hospital bed taking longer. Waiting times are also up for non-urgent care: 7 million people are…

    Read more

  • Honesty and Public Health Communication: Part 2

    Written by Rebecca Brown This post is based on two recently accepted articles: Brown and de Barra ‘A Taxonomy of Non-Honesty in Public Health Communication’, and de Barra and Brown ‘Public Health Communication Should be More Transparent’. In a previous post, I discussed some of the requirements for public health institutions to count as ‘honest’.…

    Read more