Discourse on Parfit’s Absurd Conclusion and the Challenge of Moral Intuition

Though oft regarded as straightforward in its moral calculus, utilitarianism necessarily causes a rift between the impersonal logic of aggregation and the subjective nature of well-being. Parfit rejects the Person-Affecting View to address the Non-Identity Problem, but in doing so, he drives us toward the Repugnant Conclusion. In response, this essay (albeit brief), a reframing of the Absurd Conclusion is attempted; primarily, the assumption of a fixed, objective threshold for a life worth living. By introducing variable, subject-relative thresholds, it is argued, in particular, that there exists the possibility to preserve the moral permissibility of adding lives without lowering the perceived average well-being.