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Does It Matter that Nothing We Do Will Matter in a Million Years?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 April 2009

Skott Brill
Affiliation:
Frostburg State University

Abstract

People have inferred that our lives are absurd from the supposed fact that nothing we do will matter in a million years. In this article, I critically discuss this argument for absurdity. After explaining how two refutations in the literature fail to undermine the best version of the argument, I produce several considerations that together do take much of the force out of the argument. I conclude by suggesting that these considerations not only refute this argument for absurdity, but also constitute a motivation to be moral.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 2007

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