This House Believes You Can Put A Number On Human Life | Cambridge Union

This debate took place on Thursday 1st February 2024 at 8:00pm in the Debating Chamber.

As modelling and technological capacity improves, an old problem on morality is rearing its head, especially as we all were confronted with the grim graphs of the COVID-19 pandemic. Is morality and human life calculable, a hedonic calculus of pleasure or pain, and can we theoretically get there?

New movements, such as the Effective Altruism Movement, are strongly arguing yes, arguing for a revolutionary new approach to modelling where all impacts can be measured, fulfilling the vision of Bentham and allowing us to more precisely target policy and charity. Others strongly propound that they are chasing the impossible, and that such an attitude can result in dangerous policy making decisions that put the will of the majority over the needs of the minority.

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Proposition:

JAMES LESTER

James is the head of the Cambridge Effective Altruism Society. He is a third-year student studying Economics at Emmanuel College. He won the right to speak through process of audition.

NAVYA KUMAR

Navya is a third-year student reading Economics at Homerton College. She won the right to speak through process of audition

SABRINA LEHMANN

Sabrina is completing an MPhil in Bioscience Enterprise at Newnham College. She won the right to speak through process of audition.

Opposition:

MARK FABIAN

Mark Fabian is an assistant professor of public policy at the University of Warwick in the department of politics and international studies (PAIS) and an affiliate researcher at the Bennett Institute for Public Policy at Cambridge University. His work, especially A Theory of Subjective Wellbeing, seeks to define what wellbeing is and how it can be measured, and how to factor in the role of lived experience in these decisions.

PROFESSOR ALICE CRARY

Alice Crary is a Professor of Philosophy and also Visiting Fellow at Regent's Park College, University of Oxford. Professor Crary is a distinguished novelist and scholar on ethics, Wittgenstein as well as on animal rights and ethics; her publications include Inside Ethics and Animal Crisis: A New Critical Theory.

PROFESSOR NICHOLAS MCBRIDE

Professor Nicholas McBride is the Director of Studies for Law at Pembroke College, Cambridge, as well as a life fellow of All Soul's College in Oxford. In his legal work, Professor McBride has taken a particular interest in legal philosophy, especially through his book Great Debates in Jursiprudence.

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