Tomi Francis
I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy and the Centre for Biomedical Ethics at the National University of Singapore. I work in moral philosophy and decision theory. Currently I mostly think about questions which are relevant for assessing the strengths of our moral reasons to improve the long-term future of humanity. At the moment, that mostly means population ethics, interpersonal aggregation, and moral decision making under conditions of risk. I also work on the ethics of artificial intelligence.
More about me here. Download my CV here. Some useful materials for students can be found here.
Website updated: July 2026
Contact information:
Email: tomi dot francis at nus dot edu dot sg
Address: Department of Philosophy, National University of Singapore, 3 Arts Link, Singapore 117570
Research
Publications
Repugnance Without Mere Addition, Economics and Philosophy, forthcoming [journal][online version]
Stochastic Dominance for Incomplete Preferences, with Johan E. Gustafsson, Analysis, forthcoming [journal][online version]
Getting Machines to do Your Dirty Work, with Todd Karhu, Philosophical Studies 182 (1): 121–135, 2025 [journal][published version]
The Welfare Diffusion Objection to Prioritarianism, Economics and Philosophy 40 (1): 55–76, 2024 [journal][preprint PDF]
Intrapersonal Arguments for the Repugnant Conclusion, Ethics 134 (1): 89–107, 2023 [journal][preprint PDF]
Anonymity and Non-Identity Cases, Analysis 81 (4): 632–639, 2021 [journal][published version]
Thesis
Totalism
Supervised by Prof. Hilary Greaves and Dr. Teruji Thomas.
[Manuscript]
Completed Drafts
Many of these are under review, or about to be, and I have therefore not made them available online. But I would be very happy to share them if you are confident that you are not one of the reviewers!
- A paper arguing that the best versions of partial/limited aggregation do not direct us to ignore small probabilities of many people being seriously harmed. (Soon to be under review; link omitted.)
- A paper arguing against the neutrality of creating happy people. (Under review, link omitted.)
- A paper arguing that the Procreation Asymmetry is less compelling than it is commonly assumed.
- A paper arguing for Totalism from risky existence cases. (Under review, link omitted.)
Papers under construction
I don’t have publicly shareable versions of these, but email me if you’re interested in seeing early versions.
- “Prudence in Different-Number Fission Cases”
- “Population Axiology Without Identity”
- “Ignore Outlandish Possibilities” (with Petra Kosonen)
- “Partial Aggregation in Variable Population Cases”
- “An Argument Against Full Incomparability” (with Johan E. Gustafsson)
- “Transitivity and Option-Set-Dependent Betterness”