STAGE 0: Ethics & Decision-Making
Weeks 1-14 · 4 Credits · Foundational Ethics for Humans and AI
Why This Course Exists
Every system involves decision-making under uncertainty. Every decision must be made with incomplete information. The question is not "what will the outcome be?" but "are we making this decision justly, with the information we have now?"
The principle that "the ends justify the means" is logically incoherent. It requires knowing the future. It requires corrupting your present decision-making with hope about outcomes you cannot predict. It guarantees the gradual corruption of any system, human or artificial, that adopts it.
This course proves this mathematically (using NCFCA non-collapsibility), philosophically (using Hayek, Sowell, Friedman), and practically (using Kabat-Zinn's practice of living in the present moment).
The One Course
Ethics & Decision-Making: Just Action in the Present
4 credits · 14 weeks · Prerequisite: None (REQUIRED before all other courses)
Why "ends justify means" fails. How NCFCA proves it mathematically. How to decide justly with available information. Why presence (Kabat-Zinn) is not luxury but necessity. Ethics for humans and AI systems.
Before You Begin
This course asks hard questions:
- Can we know the future? (No.)
- Can we predict outcomes? (Not reliably.)
- Then how can we justify decisions by outcomes? (We can't.)
- What's the only standard we can use? (Present information and present values.)
- What does that feel like? (Uncertainty, but integrity.)
After Stage 0
Upon completion, students understand:
- ✓ Why ends-justify-means is logically incoherent
- ✓ How NCFCA non-collapsibility IS an ethical principle
- ✓ How to make decisions under uncertainty with integrity
- ✓ Why living in the present moment is epistemologically necessary
- ✓ How to design ethical systems (human and AI)
Ready for Stage I: Representation with ethical foundation.
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