“Future people count. There could be a lot of them. And we can make their lives better. To help others as much as possible, we must think about the long-term impact of our actions.
The idea that future people count is common sense. Suppose that I drop a glass bottle while hiking. If I don’t clean it up, a child might cut herself on the shards. Does it matter when the child will cut herself — a week, or a decade, or a century from now? No. Harm is harm, whenever it occurs.
Future people, after all, are people. They will exist. They will have hopes and joys and pains and regrets, just like the rest of us. They just don’t exist yet.”
From: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/05/opinion/the-case-for-longtermism.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/05/opinion/the-case-for-longtermism.html?referringSource=articleShare
