The ethics of empty worlds

Australasian Journal of Philosophy 83 (3):349-356 (2005)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Drawing inspiration from the ethical pluralism of G. E. Moore's Principia Ethica, I contend that one empty world can be morally better than another. By ?empty? I mean that it is devoid of concrete entities (things that have a position in space or time). These worlds have no thickets or thimbles, no thinkers, no thoughts. Infinitely many of these worlds have laws of nature, abstract entities, and perhaps, space and time. These non-concrete differences are enough to make some of them better than others. 1I thank Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, John Carroll, and Gideon Rosen for their comments and suggestions

Other Versions

No versions found

Links

PhilArchive

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Here Goes Nothing.Barry Lee - 2016 - European Journal of Analytic Philosophy 12 (1):27-45.
Something Rather Than Nothing.Guido Imaguire - 2022 - Philosophy 97 (1):1-22.
Mentaculus Laws and Metaphysics.Heather Demarest - 2019 - Principia: An International Journal of Epistemology 23 (3):387--399.
Pareto Principles in Infinite Ethics.Amanda Askell - 2018 - Dissertation, New York University
Combinatorialism and the possibility of nothing.David Efird & Tom Stoneham - 2006 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 84 (2):269 – 280.
The subtraction argument(s).Alexander C. Paseau - 2006 - Dialectica 60 (2):145–156.
The Modal Dimension.Giluano Torrengo - 2011 - Humana Mente 4 (19):105-120.

Analytics

Added to PP
2009-01-28

Downloads
196 (#205,638)

6 months
8 (#1,346,238)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Roy Sorensen
University of Texas at Austin

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

Philosophical Explanations.Robert Nozick - 1981 - Philosophy 58 (223):118-121.
Four Dimensionalism.Theodore Sider - 1997 - Philosophical Review 106 (2):197-231.
Four Dimensionalism: An Ontology of Persistence and Time.Theodore Sider - 2004 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 68 (3):642-647.
Future generations: Further problems.Derek Parfit - 1982 - Philosophy and Public Affairs 11 (2):113-172.
Why Is There Anything At All?Peter van Inwagen & E. J. Lowe - 1996 - Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume 70 (1):95-120.

View all 13 references / Add more references