The immorality of computer games: Defending the endorsement view against Young’s objections

Ostritsch, Sebastian; Ulbricht, Samuel

doi:10.1007/s10676-020-09549-9

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…He describes socially constructed norms that ground our moral intuitions regarding the Gamer's Dilemma. Therefore, Young's remarks remain in the realm of Descriptive Ethics: Young's 'Constructive Ecumenical Expressivism' may explain social conventions and moral intuitions, but it cannot justify moral norms in a strong sense (Ostritsch & Ulbricht 2021). There are important normative differences between social and moral norms (Bicchieri 2006).…”

Section: Are Virtual Crimes Morally Forbidden?mentioning

confidence: 99%

A Kantian response to the Gamer’s Dilemma

Ulbricht¹

2023

Ethics Inf Technol

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The Gamer’s Dilemma consists of three intuitively plausible but conflicting assertions: (i) Virtual murder is morally permissible. (ii) Virtual child molestation is morally forbidden. (iii) There is no relevant moral difference between virtual murder and virtual child molestation in computer games. Numerous attempts to resolve (or dissolve) the Gamer’s Dilemma line the field of computer game ethics. Mostly, the phenomenon is approached using expressivist argumentation: Reprehensible virtual actions express something immoral in their performance but are not immoral by themselves. Consequentialists, on the other hand, claim that the immorality of virtual actions arises from their harmful consequences. I argue that both approaches have serious difficulties meeting the moral challenge posed by the Gamer’s Dilemma. They tend to confuse the morality of in-game actions either with the morality of their real-world counterparts or with the morality of games as objects. Following this critical analysis, I will develop a Kantian argument and defend it against two objections. So far, deontological responses to the Gamer’s Dilemma have been sought in vain. Yet, with Kant, its moral challenge can be met by looking at the gamer’s reasons. From this perspective, the Gamer’s Dilemma is based on a false assumption: the moral status of gaming acts does not derive from a normative equation with their real-world counterparts but only from their justifications.

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Section: Are Virtual Crimes Morally Forbidden?mentioning

confidence: 99%

A Kantian response to the Gamer’s Dilemma

Ulbricht¹

2023

Ethics Inf Technol

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Ethics of Computer Gaming

Ulbricht¹

2022

Ethics of Computer Gaming

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The gamer’s dilemma: an expressivist response

Young

2024

Ethics Inf Technol

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In this paper, I support a hybrid form of expressivism called constructive ecumenical expressivism (CEE) which I have previously used (to attempt) to resolve the gamer’s dilemma. (Young, 2016. Resolving the gamer’s dilemma. London: Palgrave Macmillan.) In support of CEE, I argue that the various other attempts at either resolving, dissolving or resisting the dilemma are consistent with CEE’s moral framework. That is, with its way of explaining what a claim to morality is, with how moral norms are established, with the role intuition is able to play in establishing these norms, and therefore with how the gamer’s dilemma can be resolved. I also demonstrate, more broadly, how CEE advocates robust relativism as a means of justifying the constructed moral norm’s normative credentials, and therefore how one society’s norm can be judged morally superior to another’s.

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The immorality of computer games: Defending the endorsement view against Young’s objections

Abstract: Garry Young has made three objections against Sebastian Ostritsch's endorsement view on the immorality of computer games. In this paper, we want to defend the endorsement view against all three of them.

Cited by 4 publications

References 14 publications

A Kantian response to the Gamer’s Dilemma

A Kantian response to the Gamer’s Dilemma

Ethics of Computer Gaming

The gamer’s dilemma: an expressivist response

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