Word.ws English Dictionary

lifeboat ethics

lifeboat ethics noun: a system of ethics based on "first come, first served" or "every man for himself" rather than the fair distribution of resources.

Noun

lifeboat ethics (uncountable)

  1. A system of ethics based on "first come, first served" or "every man for himself" rather than the fair distribution of resources.
    Synonyms:
    lifeboatism

Synonyms of lifeboat ethics

Origin of lifeboat ethics

Proposed by the ecologist Garrett Hardin, who gave the example of a lifeboat that can hold 50 people but is surrounded by 100 swimmers.

Questions about lifeboat ethics

What does lifeboat ethics mean?
Lifeboat ethics means a system of ethics based on "first come, first served" or "every man for himself" rather than the fair distribution of resources.
What part of speech is lifeboat ethics?
Lifeboat ethics is a noun.

Words near lifeboat ethics in the dictionary

  1. lifebelt
  2. lifebelts
  3. lifeblood
  4. lifebloods
  5. lifeboat
  6. lifeboat ethics
  7. lifeboated
  8. lifeboathouse
  9. lifeboathouses
  10. lifeboating
  11. lifeboatism

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lifeboat ethics (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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