Abstract

Recently, John Danaher and Sven Nyholm argued that partial “digital duplicates” of real persons (simulations and imitations) prima facie makes the real person less valuable because they become less scarce. They call this the “scarcity problem.” If true, this thesis is amongst the most important insights in ethics of technology because of the simplicity of duplication. However, based on an analysis of their argument, I suggest that the thesis has no support.