The Many, the Few, and the Nature of Value

Ergo: An Open Access Journal of Philosophy 9 (4):70-87 (2022)
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Abstract

John Taurek argues that, in a choice between saving the many or the few, the numbers should not count. Some object that this view clashes with the transitivity of ‘better than’; others insist the clash can be avoided. I defend a middle ground: Taurek cannot have transitivity, but that doesn’t doom his view, given a suitable conception of value. I then formalize and explore two conceptions: one context-sensitive, one multidimensional.

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Daniel Muñoz
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Citations of this work

Each Counts for One.Daniel Muñoz - forthcoming - Philosophical Studies:1-18.
Dimensions of Value.Brian Hedden & Daniel Muñoz - 2024 - Noûs 58 (2):291-305.
Sources of transitivity.Daniel Muñoz - 2023 - Economics and Philosophy 39 (2):285-306.
Save the Five: Meeting Taurek's Challenge.Zach Barnett - forthcoming - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.

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References found in this work

On What Matters: Two-Volume Set.Derek Parfit - 2011 - New York: Oxford University Press.
What We Owe to Each Other.Thomas Scanlon - 2002 - Mind 111 (442):323-354.

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