Tim Mulgan
Biographic Data
| ID | 1490337 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Tim Mulgan |
| GIVEN NAMES | Tim |
| FAMILY NAME | Mulgan |
| SIGNATURE | MULGAN T |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Auckland |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9368-1524 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 31 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 16 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 31 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1993 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Anselm on That, This, and Panpsychism
This articles reimagines Anselm’s claim that God is ‘that than which a greater cannot be thought’ [Hereafter: ‘THAT’]. The article first explores a variety of Anselm-inspired of what THAT is like, and how THAT relates to whatever (if anything) is not-THAT (hereafter: ‘THIS’). THAT could be Anselm’s creator God, a polytheist pantheon, or a single undifferentiated One/Absolute/Brahman. THIS could be a single possible world or a pluriverse containin…
Why philosophers should read Paradise Lost
This article reinterprets John Milton’s Paradise Lost as a contribution to contemporary analytic philosophy of religion. Milton offers a novel free-will defence, similar to Alvin Plantinga’s, grounded in original philosophical accounts of God, creation, freedom, and meta-ethics. Milton’s monist God creates worlds and creatures ex deo out of God-self. God – and everything else – is animated matter: one substance both material and spiritual. Milton…
Intercultural Philosophy and Environmental Justice between Generations: Indigenous, African, Asian, and Western Perspectives
This anthology combines an intercultural approach with intergenerational ethics to address critical environmental challenges. Written by scholars from all over the world, including Canada, the US, New Zealand, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Japan, the UK, China, and Spain, this book offers new perspectives on how to foster sustainable societal practises that draw on the past and are fair to future generations. It introduces the Māori idea that views all thin…
From Brad to worse: Rule‐consequentialism and undesirable futures
This paper asks how rule‐consequentialism might adapt to very adverse futures, and whether moderate liberal consequentialism can survive into broken futures and/or futures where humanity faces imminent extinction. The paper first recaps the recent history of rule‐consequentialist procreative ethics. It outlines rule‐consequentialism, extends it to cover future people, and applies it to broken futures. The paper then introduces a new thought exper…
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism
Moral theories can be distinguished, not only by the answers they give, but also by the questions they ask. Utilitarianism's central commitment is to the promotion of well-being, impartially considered. This commitment shapes utilitarianism in a number of ways. If scarce resources should be directed where they will best promote well-being, and if theoretical attention is a scarce resource, then moral theorists should focus on topics that are most…
Beyond Theism and Atheism: Axiarchism and Ananthropocentric Purposivism
Two familiar worldviews dominate Western philosophy: materialist atheism and Abrahamic theism. One exciting development in recent philosophy of religion is the exploration of alternatives to both theism and atheism. This paper explores two alternatives: axiarchism and ananthropocentrism. Drawing on the long tradition of Platonism, axiarchists such as John Leslie, Derek Parfit and Nicholas Rescher posit adirectlink between goodness and existence. …
Utilitarianism for a Broken World
Drawing on the author's recent book Ethics for a Broken World , this article explores the philosophical implications of the fact that climate change – or something like it – might lead to a broken world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs, and where our affluent way of life is no longer an option. It argues that the broken world has an impact, not only on applied ethics, but also on moral theory. It then explores that …
Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies
These two fascinating books have much in common. Both, though written by philosophers, are aimed primarily at a non-philosophical audience; both provide state-of-the-art surveys of a wide range of academic and non-academic literatures; each deals with a potentially urgent threat to contemporary lifestyles and values; and each canvasses possible responses to that threat. Anyone interested in the future of humanity will learn much from these books.…
Purpose in the Universe: The Moral and Metaphysical Case for Ananthropocentric Purposivism
Two familiar worldviews dominate Western philosophy: materialist atheism and the benevolent God of the Abrahamic faiths. Tim Mulgan explores a third way. Ananthropocentric Purposivism claims that there is a cosmic purpose, but human beings are irrelevant to it. Purpose in the Universe develops a philosophical case for Ananthropocentric Purposivism that it is at least as strong as the case for either theism or atheism. The book borrows traditional…
Utilitarianism and our obligations to future people
A summary is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.
The Cambridge Companion to Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism, the approach to ethics based on the maximization of overall well-being, continues to have great traction in moral philosophy and political thought. This Companion offers a systematic exploration of its history, themes, and applications. First, it traces the origins and development of utilitarianism via the work of Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Henry Sidgwick, and others. The volume then explores issues in the formulation of ut…
Ethics for a Broken World: Imagining Philosophy after Catastrophe
Imagine living in the future in a world already damaged by humankind, a world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs and where a chaotic climate makes life precarious. Then imagine looking back into the past, back to our own time and assessing the ethics of the early twenty-first century. "Ethics for a Broken World" imagines how the future might judge us and how living in a time of global environmental degradation might u…
Understanding Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism - a philosophy based on the principle of the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people - has been hugely influential over the past two centuries. Beyond ethics or morality, utilitarian assumptions and arguments abound in modern economic and political life, especially in public policy. An understanding of utilitarianism is indeed essential to any understanding of contemporary society. "Understanding Utilitarianism" presen…
Ethics for a Broken World: Imagining Philosophy After Catastrophe
Imagine living in the future in a world already damaged by humankind, a world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs and where a chaotic climate makes life precarious. Then imagine looking into the past - back to our own time - and assessing the ethics of the early twenty-first century.
The future of utilitarianism
My recent work has focused on the demands of utilitarianism, and our obligations to future people. In my current work, I draw on that earlier work, and ask how utilitarians might deal with the ethical challenges of climate change. Climate change has obvious practical implications. It will kill millions of people, wipe out thousands of species, and so on. My question in this paper is much narrower. How might climate change impact on moral theory —…
The Future of Utilitarianism
The Future of Utilitarianism Tim Mulgan (bio) My recent work has focused on the demands of utilitarianism, and our obligations to future people.1 In my current work, I draw on that earlier work, and ask how utilitarians might deal with the ethical challenges of climate change.2 Climate change has obvious practical implications. It will kill millions of people, wipe out thousands of species, and so on. My question in this paper is much narrower. H…
Ethics for a Broken World: Imagining Philosophy after Catastrophe
Weighing Lives
Journal Article Weighing Lives Get access Weighing Lives. John Broome, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Pp. ix + 278. Price £18.99.) Tim Mulgan Tim Mulgan University of St Andrews Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Philosophical Quarterly, Volume 58, Issue 231, April 2008, Pages 363–368, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9213.2008.517.x Published: 19 March 2008
Future People: A Moderate Consequentialist Account of our Obligations to Future Generations
This book develops a new theory of the obligations to future generations, based on a new Rule Consequentialist account of the morality of individual reproduction. The result is a coherent, intuitively plausible moral theory that is not unreasonably demanding — even when extended to cover future people — and that accounts for a wide range of independently plausible intuitions covering individual morality, intergenerational justice, and internation…
The Non-Identity Problem
La démocratie post mortem
Mulgan Tim, Couillard Pascal. La démocratie post mortem. In: Revue Philosophique de Louvain. Quatrième série, tome 101, n°1, 2003. pp. 123-137
Reproducing the Contractarian State
The Reverse Repugnant Conclusion
Total utilitarianism implies Parfit's repugnant conclusion. For any world (A) containing ten billion very happy people, there is a better world (Z) where a vast number of people have lives barely worth living. One common response is to claim that life in Parfit's Z is better than he suggests, and thus that his conclusion is not repugnant. This paper shows that this strategy cannot succeeed. Total utilitarianism also implies a reverse repugnant co…
What's Really Wrong with the Limited Quantity View
In Part Four of Reasons and Persons, Derek Parfit seeks Theory X – the Utilitarian account of the morality of choices where the number of people who will ever exist depends upon our actions. Parfit argues that X has yet to be found. The two simplest versions of Theory X are Total Utilitarianism and Average Utilitarianism. Unfortunately, Parfit argues, each of these leads to unacceptable results. Parfit explores various alternatives and finds them…
Understanding Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism - a philosophy based on the principle of the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people - has been hugely influential over the past two centuries. Beyond ethics or morality, utilitarian assumptions and arguments abound in modern economic and political life, especially in public policy. An understanding of utilitarianism is indeed essential to any understanding of contemporary society. "Understanding Utilitarianism" presen…
Utilitarianism for a Broken World
Drawing on the author's recent book Ethics for a Broken World , this article explores the philosophical implications of the fact that climate change – or something like it – might lead to a broken world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs, and where our affluent way of life is no longer an option. It argues that the broken world has an impact, not only on applied ethics, but also on moral theory. It then explores that …
The Place of the Dead in Liberal Political Philosophy
The Future of Utilitarianism
The Future of Utilitarianism Tim Mulgan (bio) My recent work has focused on the demands of utilitarianism, and our obligations to future people.1 In my current work, I draw on that earlier work, and ask how utilitarians might deal with the ethical challenges of climate change.2 Climate change has obvious practical implications. It will kill millions of people, wipe out thousands of species, and so on. My question in this paper is much narrower. H…
The Reverse Repugnant Conclusion
Total utilitarianism implies Parfit's repugnant conclusion. For any world (A) containing ten billion very happy people, there is a better world (Z) where a vast number of people have lives barely worth living. One common response is to claim that life in Parfit's Z is better than he suggests, and thus that his conclusion is not repugnant. This paper shows that this strategy cannot succeeed. Total utilitarianism also implies a reverse repugnant co…
What's Really Wrong with the Limited Quantity View
In Part Four of Reasons and Persons, Derek Parfit seeks Theory X – the Utilitarian account of the morality of choices where the number of people who will ever exist depends upon our actions. Parfit argues that X has yet to be found. The two simplest versions of Theory X are Total Utilitarianism and Average Utilitarianism. Unfortunately, Parfit argues, each of these leads to unacceptable results. Parfit explores various alternatives and finds them…
The Unhappy Conclusion and the Life of Virtue
Journal Article The Unhappy Conclusion and the Life of Virtue Get access Tim Mulgan Tim Mulgan Wolfson College, Oxford Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Philosophical Quarterly, Volume 43, Issue 172, July 1993, Pages 357–359, https://doi.org/10.2307/2219900 Published: 01 July 1993
Rule Consequentialism and Famine
Journal Article Rule consequentialism and famine Get access Tim Mulgan Tim Mulgan Wolfson CollegeOxford OX2 [email protected] Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Analysis, Volume 54, Issue 3, July 1994, Pages 187–192, https://doi.org/10.1093/analys/54.3.187 Published: 01 July 1994
A Non-proportional Hybrid Moral Theory
A common objection to consequentialism is that it makes unreasonable demands upon moral agents, by failing to allow agents to give special weight to their own personal projects and interests. A prominent recent response to this objection is that of Samuel Scheffler, who seeks to make room for moral agents by building agent-centred prerogatives into a consequentialist moral theory. In this paper, I present a new objection to Scheffler's account. I…
Two Conceptions of Benevolence
The Place of the Dead in Liberal Political Philosophy
Two Moral Counterfactuals
What's Really Wrong with the Limited Quantity View
In Part Four of Reasons and Persons, Derek Parfit seeks Theory X – the Utilitarian account of the morality of choices where the number of people who will ever exist depends upon our actions. Parfit argues that X has yet to be found. The two simplest versions of Theory X are Total Utilitarianism and Average Utilitarianism. Unfortunately, Parfit argues, each of these leads to unacceptable results. Parfit explores various alternatives and finds them…
Reproducing the Contractarian State
The Reverse Repugnant Conclusion
Total utilitarianism implies Parfit's repugnant conclusion. For any world (A) containing ten billion very happy people, there is a better world (Z) where a vast number of people have lives barely worth living. One common response is to claim that life in Parfit's Z is better than he suggests, and thus that his conclusion is not repugnant. This paper shows that this strategy cannot succeeed. Total utilitarianism also implies a reverse repugnant co…
The Non-Identity Problem
La démocratie post mortem
Mulgan Tim, Couillard Pascal. La démocratie post mortem. In: Revue Philosophique de Louvain. Quatrième série, tome 101, n°1, 2003. pp. 123-137
Future People: A Moderate Consequentialist Account of our Obligations to Future Generations
This book develops a new theory of the obligations to future generations, based on a new Rule Consequentialist account of the morality of individual reproduction. The result is a coherent, intuitively plausible moral theory that is not unreasonably demanding — even when extended to cover future people — and that accounts for a wide range of independently plausible intuitions covering individual morality, intergenerational justice, and internation…
Weighing Lives
Journal Article Weighing Lives Get access Weighing Lives. John Broome, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Pp. ix + 278. Price £18.99.) Tim Mulgan Tim Mulgan University of St Andrews Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Philosophical Quarterly, Volume 58, Issue 231, April 2008, Pages 363–368, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9213.2008.517.x Published: 19 March 2008
Ethics for a Broken World: Imagining Philosophy After Catastrophe
Imagine living in the future in a world already damaged by humankind, a world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs and where a chaotic climate makes life precarious. Then imagine looking into the past - back to our own time - and assessing the ethics of the early twenty-first century.
The future of utilitarianism
My recent work has focused on the demands of utilitarianism, and our obligations to future people. In my current work, I draw on that earlier work, and ask how utilitarians might deal with the ethical challenges of climate change. Climate change has obvious practical implications. It will kill millions of people, wipe out thousands of species, and so on. My question in this paper is much narrower. How might climate change impact on moral theory —…
The Future of Utilitarianism
The Future of Utilitarianism Tim Mulgan (bio) My recent work has focused on the demands of utilitarianism, and our obligations to future people.1 In my current work, I draw on that earlier work, and ask how utilitarians might deal with the ethical challenges of climate change.2 Climate change has obvious practical implications. It will kill millions of people, wipe out thousands of species, and so on. My question in this paper is much narrower. H…
Ethics for a Broken World: Imagining Philosophy after Catastrophe
Utilitarianism and our obligations to future people
A summary is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. Please use the Get access link above for information on how to access this content.
The Cambridge Companion to Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism, the approach to ethics based on the maximization of overall well-being, continues to have great traction in moral philosophy and political thought. This Companion offers a systematic exploration of its history, themes, and applications. First, it traces the origins and development of utilitarianism via the work of Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill, Henry Sidgwick, and others. The volume then explores issues in the formulation of ut…
Ethics for a Broken World: Imagining Philosophy after Catastrophe
Imagine living in the future in a world already damaged by humankind, a world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs and where a chaotic climate makes life precarious. Then imagine looking back into the past, back to our own time and assessing the ethics of the early twenty-first century. "Ethics for a Broken World" imagines how the future might judge us and how living in a time of global environmental degradation might u…
Understanding Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism - a philosophy based on the principle of the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people - has been hugely influential over the past two centuries. Beyond ethics or morality, utilitarian assumptions and arguments abound in modern economic and political life, especially in public policy. An understanding of utilitarianism is indeed essential to any understanding of contemporary society. "Understanding Utilitarianism" presen…
Utilitarianism for a Broken World
Drawing on the author's recent book Ethics for a Broken World , this article explores the philosophical implications of the fact that climate change – or something like it – might lead to a broken world where resources are insufficient to meet everyone's basic needs, and where our affluent way of life is no longer an option. It argues that the broken world has an impact, not only on applied ethics, but also on moral theory. It then explores that …
Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies
These two fascinating books have much in common. Both, though written by philosophers, are aimed primarily at a non-philosophical audience; both provide state-of-the-art surveys of a wide range of academic and non-academic literatures; each deals with a potentially urgent threat to contemporary lifestyles and values; and each canvasses possible responses to that threat. Anyone interested in the future of humanity will learn much from these books.…
Purpose in the Universe: The Moral and Metaphysical Case for Ananthropocentric Purposivism
Two familiar worldviews dominate Western philosophy: materialist atheism and the benevolent God of the Abrahamic faiths. Tim Mulgan explores a third way. Ananthropocentric Purposivism claims that there is a cosmic purpose, but human beings are irrelevant to it. Purpose in the Universe develops a philosophical case for Ananthropocentric Purposivism that it is at least as strong as the case for either theism or atheism. The book borrows traditional…
Beyond Theism and Atheism: Axiarchism and Ananthropocentric Purposivism
Two familiar worldviews dominate Western philosophy: materialist atheism and Abrahamic theism. One exciting development in recent philosophy of religion is the exploration of alternatives to both theism and atheism. This paper explores two alternatives: axiarchism and ananthropocentrism. Drawing on the long tradition of Platonism, axiarchists such as John Leslie, Derek Parfit and Nicholas Rescher posit adirectlink between goodness and existence. …
Philosophy (20 works) · Epistemology (17 works) · Sociology (17 works) · Political science (15 works) · Law (13 works) · Philosophical Ethics and Theory (13 works) · Political Philosophy and Ethics (12 works) · Computer Science (11 works) · Philosophy (11 works) · Environmental ethics (10 works)