From Mollusks to Machines: An Ethical Framework Focused on the Urgency of Extreme Suffering

Ethical thinking can be pragmatically framed as striving for impact in improving the world, without relying on traditional moral language. Consciousness or sentience is central to anything mattering, but only suffering has an inherent urgency to be addressed. This call to action applies regardless of species or physical substrate. From a perspective on personal identity that recognizes separateness as an illusion, the most extreme suffering can be considered intolerable per se, not just for the physical being experiencing it. Prioritizing the prevention of such suffering is therefore rational. Strong, potentially competing intuitions, including the desire to thrive, must also be accommodated for an ethical framework to be viable, without the creation of happiness formally balancing out intense suffering that exists elsewhere. A framework termed "xNU+" captures these considerations. Suffering metrics such as Years Lived with Severe Suffering (YLSS) and Days Lived with Extreme Suffering (DLES), used alongside existing health and well-being metrics, would better track what matters, in humans and, using different methodologies, in other species and potential artificial sentient entities. The rapid, potentially irreversible, technology-driven transformations now occurring on our planet make it urgent that we embed a suffering-focused ethical framework in our governance and policy-making.