Green, F; Meyer, LH; (2024) Harmless Loss: Its Moral, Political and Legal Significance. Ethical Perspectives , 31 (3) pp. 133-160. 10.2143/EP.31.3.3293950.

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Abstract

What is ‘loss’? When, and why, does it matter? Analytic-philosophical consideration of loss has been overshadowed by the neighbouring concept of harm. But the two are distinct, and the distinction matters. We argue that the best conception of loss captures a wide range of diminutions, of any magnitude, in the feature-set of an entity, whereas the best conception of harm captures only significant diminutions in wellbeing of humans (and other living beings with moral status). In the space between the two concepts lies an under-theorised concept we call harmless loss, which does important conceptual work in cases of trivial wellbeing loss, losses to non-wellbeing goods, and losses to non-human agents. Our conceptual scheme motivates principles of reasoning according to which decision-makers should take account of harms and ignore harmless losses, except where they have special duties to avoid losses. These principles advance debates about climate change ‘loss and damage’ and the ‘just transition’ to a low-carbon economy.

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