The parliamentary approach to moral uncertainty

Working paper

We introduce a novel approach to the problem of decision-making under moral uncertainty, based on an analogy to a parliament. The appropriate choice under moral uncertainty is the one that would be reached by a parliament comprised of delegates representing the interests of each moral theory, who number in proportion to your credence in that theory. We present what we see as the best specific approach of this kind (based on proportional chances voting), and also show how the parliamentary approach can be used as a general framework for thinking about moral uncertainty, where extant approaches to addressing moral uncertainty correspond to parliaments with different rules and procedures.

Authors: Newberry, T; Ord, T

• Publication status: Published
• Publisher: Future of Humanity Institute, University of Oxford
• Series: FHI Technical Report
• Publication date: 2021-01-01
• Paper number: 2021-2
• Language: English