neartermism
neartermism noun: an ethical theory which prioritizes improving the conditions of the present and near future, rather than thinking about the distant future (as in longtermism).
Noun
neartermism (uncountable)
- An ethical theory which prioritizes improving the conditions of the present and near future, rather than thinking about the distant future (as in longtermism).
- Longtermists are in daily conversation with neartermists. It’s a red herring to argue that “abandoning what would most help people on Earth today isn’t exactly ethically sound.”2022 September 9, Theodore Leinwand, “Neartermism and longtermism aren’t at odds”, in The Washington Post
- Effective altruists talk about both “neartermism” and “longtermism.” […] This question is like an inflection point between neartermism and longtermism. MacAskill cites the philosopher Derek Parfit, whose ideas about population ethics in his 1984 book “Reasons and Persons” have been influential in...2022 December 9, Jennifer Szalai, “Effective Altruism Warned of Risks. Did It Also Incentivize Them?”, in The New York Times
- Antonyms:
- longtermism
Antonyms of neartermism
Origin of neartermism
From near-term + -ism.
Questions about neartermism
- What does neartermism mean?
- Neartermism means an ethical theory which prioritizes improving the conditions of the present and near future, rather than thinking about the distant future (as in longtermism).
- What part of speech is neartermism?
- Neartermism is a noun.
Words near neartermism in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: neartermism (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.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “neartermism.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/neartermism. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.