General provisions

The course is offered to C level students and students at advanced level. For students at advanced level, the examination requirements are higher than for students at C level.

Entry requirements

60 credits in Practical Philosophy or 60 credits in Theoretical Philosophy

Learning outcomes

After completing the course the student should:

• be familiar with key concepts and main directions in population ethics
• be able to describe different proposed answers to the question "What makes one population intrinsically better than another?" and related questions
• be familiar with some of the most widely held theories of welfare
• be able to identify some advantages and disadvantages of the respective theories.

Content

Many of the choices we make affect the welfare of people who will live in the future. Many choices also affect who and how many people will live. This is true of large-scale political decisions, such as policies regarding global warming, as well as of small-scale individual decisions, such as to have a child. "Population ethics" deals with evaluative and normative questions, actualized by choices affecting the welfare, identities and number of future people. This course will focus on the following general questions: What makes one population (intrinsically or finally) better than another? Are there criteria for ranking populations in terms of value? What makes it the case that we ought to choose one population rather than another?

Instruction

Lectures and discussion. The lectures will be interactive, and the students are expected to participate in the discussion.

Assessment

A home essay of about 3500 words. Active and commendable participation during the lectures will be favourably taken into account in the examination.