Illusions in the Ethics of War — How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love
Come down to Ekonomikum and listen to Isaac Taylor speak on the subject of war ethics. In light of recent world events it is important for all of us to know what is permissible during warfare and to also question why. This lecture is a collaboration between Uppsala Association of Foreign Affairs and Philosophical Union in Uppsala. -About the lecture- For nearly as long as humans have waged war, they have discussed the ethics of war. Yet our existing international legal system governing armed conflict is built on a number of illusions about what is morally permissible in warfare. This talk will consider what members of the armed forces should do in light of this claim. Should they continue to act on the basis of these illusions, or should they resort to first-level moral principles to guide their action? Rejecting existing accounts of the ethics of participation in warfare, it argues for an account of “combatant morality”, as it can be called, that encourages caution in waging war, in light of various potential undesirable effects that can arise from developing an institution that justifies the resort to violence in ethical terms. While the theory arrived at might be viewed as a variant of pacifism, it is shown to avoid some of the standard objections that have been raised against pacifists in the past. DATE: May 15 TIME: 17:15-18:30 PLACE: Hörsal 2, Ekonomikum A warm welcome! Isaac Taylor is an associate senior lecturer in practical philosophy at Stockholm University. Before moving to Stockholm, Taylor was a Research Fellow at the Alan Turing Institute in London, where he worked with UK public sector organistaions in investigating the ethical issues surrounding emerging military technologies. Taylors research focus is on modern day war ethics, a subject which is relevant to both social science and philosophy. His current projects focuses on the use of AI might undermine responsibility and democratic governance, and how just war theory was institutionalized during the twentieth century.