Harvard University
11 HN recommenders · recommended in 13 months, 2013–2025
54:56 · 43M views · Sep 4, 2009
The first episode of Michael Sandel's Harvard course on moral reasoning, opening with the trolley problem and the choice between killing one to save five. Sandel draws out student arguments and introduces utilitarian and other approaches to justice.
One of the most frequently recommended online lecture series on HN, praised for giving people vocabulary to examine ethical positions and for Sandel's skilled teaching.
13 comments from Hacker News
Be well versed in genetics / molecular biology! - If I had the time to finish school, I'd double in biology / math or CS. Man will that be a killer combo when that kid is 30. It feels like biotech is where computing was in the 1930's... what's to come, and how it will change the world is both frightening and exciting. On the "soft" side (whatever that means): ethics, the history of ethics, from every point of view. Two lecture series I always recommend, and feel like everyone should watch with a gun to their head (as the instructor himself says): - this video -- Harvard course on justice / ethics. - [LINK] -- Robert Saposky (and guests) on the biology of human behavior. Literary theory. Gaining a deeper understanding of how masters of symbolism, language, and creativity think and put together their work; the history of literature; etc. will open you up to new ways of thinking just like studying pure maths or programming would. Now to invent a time machine and give myself this advice! Boy I could've used it.
Unfortunately, no one can really articulate the full set of human values yet, especially since they are often in conflict in real-world situations. Which value(s) should be prioritized over others? How about differing values between cultures and human groups within each culture? You might have heard of the Trolley Problem. There are many and more complicated variations of that. This Harvard session on Justice (The Moral Side of Murder) is edifying and surprisingly fun to watch: this video The problem with AGI is more acute than most other technologies because it is software-based, which makes it nigh impossible to regulate effectively, especially globally.
Indirectly related, if you have some time to spare follow Harvard's course in ethics! [1] Here is why: while it didn't teach me anything new (in a sense), it did give me a vocabulary to better articulate myself. Having new words to describe certain ideas means you have more analytical tools at your disposal. So you'll be able to examine your own ethical stance better. It takes some time, but instead of watching Netflix (if that's a thing you do), watch this instead! Although, The Good Place is a pretty good Netflix show sprinkling some basic ethics in there. [1] this video
It's like asking what makes 5 greater than 5. Humans are all significant simply because they have rational minds and are rational beings. A human being cannot impose on others a value or worthiness, because we are rational beings and have independent minds. As you probably have noticed by now this is not me saying these things, it's from Immanuel Kant. I found these lectures on the topic absolutely amazing to watch: this video
Came here to suggest Robert Sapolsky's class as well. I would also add Michael Sandel's Justice: What's the right thing to do? this video great course on moral reasoning, covers different theories of justice based on ideas from Aristotle, Kant, John Stuart Mill, John Rawls and many more, extremely well presented too.