AAP 2026 CONFERENCE: Full Schedule

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11:00am NZST

The Environmental Ethics of Overpopulation

Tuesday July 7, 2026 11:00am - 11:55am NZST

Using Trevor Hedberg’s consequentialist argument for population control, I consider some historical and modern arguments against such control, and suggest responses that address those concerns. In particular, I will argue that economic concerns and anti-colonialist anxieties are misguided. Despite this and even with the best adaptive policies, the world’s environment and climate cannot survive the number of human beings currently on the planet, much less more. While acknowledging legitimate restrictions on coercion and acknowledging the problems of effectiveness, I will suggest that there is value in recognizing a problem even where we have limited solutions. Contrary to Hedberg, I will also argue that modern industrialized societies have special obligations to restrict their procreation rates.

Speakers

Catherine McDonald

Retired, Monash University

Started out interesting in Bioethics and the Ethics of War. Now I'm interested in Environmental Ethics. (I'm interested in AI only if to the degree that I can't tolerate spruikers)

Tuesday July 7, 2026 11:00am - 11:55am NZST
N3.01

Ethics, In Person

12:00pm NZST

In Defense of the Suicidal: A Response to Kant

Tuesday July 7, 2026 12:00pm - 12:55pm NZST

MSB1.01

Immanuel Kant’s (2002) stance on suicide as an act of “debasing of humanity in one’s person” has sparked debates. There is discussion on (1) the sense in which suicide is a violation of the universalizability principle and the humanity formula and (2) Kant’s unclear and imprecise discussion on suicide. However, literature regarding the supposed inconsistency of Kant’s stance on suicide vis-à-vis his conception of morality remains underdeveloped – specifically, with reference to his Kingdom of Ends (KoE) formula. In this paper, I forward an account of Kant’s stance on suicide vis-à-vis KoE formula, underpinning the importance of Christine Korsgaard’s (1996a) idea of relations of responsible reciprocity (RR) among human beings. By focusing on Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals (2002), as well as Korsgaard’s Creating the Kingdom of Ends (1996a) and The Sources of Normativity (1996b), I investigate why and how Kant’s stance on suicide becomes an inconsistency in his very notion of morality, with reference to KoE. I argue that in problematizing Kant’s conception of morality, it is important to reexamine his notions of universalizablity, humanity, and KoE. I conclude that in discussing Kant’s stance on suicide, it is imperative to underpin KoE, a Kantian concept that recognizes RR.

Speakers

Keisha Christle Abog

Assistant Professor of Philosophy, University of the Philippines Los Baños

Assistant Professor, University of the Philippines Los Baños
Research Interests: Philosophy for Children, Philosophy of Childhood, Kantian Ethics, Philosophy of Education, Philosophy of Humor

Tuesday July 7, 2026 12:00pm - 12:55pm NZST
MSB1.01

Ethics, Remote

2:00pm NZST

Pleasure, Pain, and Hedonism: Some Current Issues

Tuesday July 7, 2026 2:00pm - 2:55pm NZST

N3.01

This paper outlines and assesses current arguments for and against the ethical hedonist claim that pleasure is the only good, and that pain is the only bad. It outlines and appraises some recent moves in ‘heterogeneity’ arguments against hedonism, and some moves in recent arguments for hedonism that appeal to an experience requirement or a resonance requirement. It also analyses contest between attitudinal and phenomenal accounts of pleasure and pain, and some differences among such accounts that matter in experience/resonance arguments for hedonism, and in heterogeneity arguments against hedonism.

Speakers

Andrew Moore

Ōtākou Whakaihu Waka | University of Otago

Tuesday July 7, 2026 2:00pm - 2:55pm NZST
N3.01

Ethics, In Person

2:00pm NZST

Procreative Asymmetry, Non-Identity, and Consistency

Tuesday July 7, 2026 2:00pm - 2:55pm NZST

MSB1.01

According to procreative asymmetry, there is a reason not to create a miserable life not worth living, whereas there is no reason to create a life worth living for its own sake. Although this idea is plausible, it is difficult to account for within a standard consequentialist framework based on population axiology. This paper proposes a new formal framework that extends consequentialism and argues that this intuition can be given a welfarist explanation in terms of dynamic consistency. More specifically, the framework evaluates actions not only in terms of the outcomes they bring about, but also in terms of the outcomes before those actions are performed. As a result, it becomes possible to distinguish between improving the well-being of existing individuals and creating new happy individuals. Within this framework, the axiom of dynamic consistency yields a result corresponding to the asymmetry. Creating a miserable life not worth living is impermissible because it is inconsistent with the ex post perspective, whereas refraining from creating a life worth living is permissible. Moreover, from the same mechanism of consistency, the intuitive judgments in the non-identity problem can also be explained in a unified way.

Speakers

Takayuki Nakamura

Kyoto University

Tuesday July 7, 2026 2:00pm - 2:55pm NZST
MSB1.01

Ethics, In Person

3:00pm NZST

Depending on Others: Towards a Unified Understanding of Virtuous Belief Formation

Tuesday July 7, 2026 3:00pm - 3:55pm NZST

N3.01

In virtue ethics and virtue epistemology, someone’s exercise of “intellectual” virtues such as open-mindedness, curiosity, and intellectual humility is understood as key to responsible and knowledge-conducive belief formation. “Moral” virtues such as generosity, courage, and kindness are largely treated as distinct and separate from their intellectual counterparts.

However, recognition of our ubiquitous dependence on others for not only information but also norms for finding and interpreting such undermines individualist approaches and implies a more complex relationship between so-called intellectual and moral virtue. This paper argues that given our beliefs are often formed by knowledge from others and are mediated through social practices of knowing, our regard and treatment of others is necessarily implicated in belief-formation and the pursuit of knowledge.

Drawing primarily on work on social epistemic dependence and Miranda Fricker’s work on epistemic injustice (2003), I propose that social epistemic dependence suggests efficacious epistemic practices rely to some extent on ethical regard for and treatment of others. This claim motivates a reconsideration of the traditional distinction between moral and intellectual virtues and provokes a need for a virtue ethic of belief which unifies moral and intellectual concerns and practices.

Speakers

Melanie Dillon-Smith

University of New England

Tuesday July 7, 2026 3:00pm - 3:55pm NZST
N3.01

Ethics, In Person

AAP 2026 CONFERENCE

11:00am NZST

Catherine McDonald

12:00pm NZST

Keisha Christle Abog

2:00pm NZST

Andrew Moore

2:00pm NZST

Takayuki Nakamura

3:00pm NZST

Melanie Dillon-Smith

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