Ethics of Computer Games

• Applicant: Dr. Sebastian Ostritsch
• Subject Area: Practical Philosophy
• Term: from 2018 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 413050359

One of the main ethical questions about computer games that is being discussed within academic philosophy is the following: What – if anything – is ethically wrong about playing violent computer games? The usual approaches try to answer this question by applying one of the three classical theories of normative ethics. In the process, they are all faced with the basic problem of ludic amoralism. According to ludic amoralism, computer games cannot be subject to moral evaluation insofar as they are merely games that are defined by the act of stepping outside the boundaries of morally assessable reality.The usual approaches have been criticized because they have not been able to identify intrinsic moral problems with regard to computer games. Instead, these approaches are based on the assumption that the exposure to computer games has severe negative causal effects. However, it is questionable whether such effects really exist; and more generally, it is not a philosophical but an empirical task to establish whether such effects exist. What makes the question about the moral acceptability of computer games so compelling from a philosophical perspective is the widespread intuition that there is something intrinsically wrong about playing certain violent computer games, i.e. that there is something wrong about such an activity regardless of any putative negative effects.The goal of this project is to introduce and defend a new answer to the challenge of ludic amoralism. In the process, I will argue for two main changes to the current debate:1. A fundamental philosophical reflection on the meaning of "ethics" and "computer game(ing)" will show the need for some basic conceptual distinctions between multiple ethical as well as multiple ludic dimensions. Only with such conceptual distinctions can we have a precise understanding of the question what (if anything) is wrong about playing certain violent computer games.2. These conceptual distinctions make it possible to change the debate from the activity of playing computer games to computer games themselves, i.e. games as interactive symbol systems. This change of perspective allows to combat ludic amoralism with the “endorsement-view”. According to it, computer games (as complex symbol systems) can be rightly subject to moral evaluation insofar as they do not only contain representations of immorality but also endorse an immoral worldview.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants