Matthew Coleman, Lucius Caviola, Geoffrey Goodwin, & Joshua Lewis
Preferences for the long-term continuation of humanity
Contact at: coleman.matt.b@gmail.com
Prior research has demonstrated that most people do not want humanity to go extinct relatively soon (Schubert, Caviola, & Faber, 2019). This may simply be because of welfarist or utilitarian considerations, such that people want future people to live long, happy lives. We hypothesized that there is an additional important psychological factor: a preference for the continued long-term existence of humanity, above and beyond welfarist considerations. In a first study, we find support for this hypothesis by demonstrating that people prefer a longer, narrower humanity (e.g., 1 million people at a time for 300,000 years) over a short, wider humanity (e.g., 1 billion people at a time for 300 years), even when the total number of people and happiness are held constant. In a follow-up study, we will test the hypothesis that this preference is driven by a greater sense of personal meaning when knowing that humanity will continue for a long time. This work has implications for moral philosophy, as well as the prioritization of global problems that concern the long-term future.
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