Year: 2025

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Favorite Cases Ballot for Your Students

Cases Poll

I’ll often slide Ethics Bowl cases into my philosophy classes based on topic. The NHSEB’s case search function and IEB’s organized case archive make this pretty easy. But sometimes it’s fun to let students choose which cases and topics they’ll cover.

Below is a list of human-generated summaries of the 2025-2026 NHSEB and IEB cases. You could turn this into a paper ballot or load them into a BrightSpace/Canvas/Blackboard survey, allow each student to pick their top five, then work through the most popular as time allows. I loaded my poll into BrightSpace – happy to export and share on request.

They’re not in order – I moved them around a bit, listing NHSEB case 5: Grade Expectations first because I think that one will catch students’ attention. IEB case 4: Shutting Out Le Pen will probably also be hot given the connection to American politics, but we’ll see – might be a topic students (wisely?) choose to avoid.

I’m polling my community college Intro to Ethics students now and am eager to see which they select. If you do the same and would like to compare results, or if you have any trouble tying the descriptions back to the case titles (I realize most folks are doing NHSEB or IEB, not both), please reach out. Also feel free to list your own favorites in a comment.

  1. Whether it’s OK for teachers who ban student AI use to use AI to prepare lectures or assignments, or grade.
  2. Whether SNAP benefits recipients should be barred from purchasing soda or other junk foods.
  3. Whether to allow prisoners to trade organ donations or bone marrow for reduced sentences.
  4. Whether the U.S. should adopt France’s approach to presidential elections and allow candidates convicted of felonies to become president, or whether France should adopt the U.S.’s approach and allow candidates to become president regardless of their criminal records, so long as they haven’t been convinced of insurrection/government overthrow (France banned Le Pen from running for five years based on an embezzlement conviction, while the U.S. allowed Trump to become president despite a felony conviction for falsifying business records tied to election hush money – essentially whether democratic popularity should override criminal convictions or whether certain convictions should disqualify candidates from high office).
  5. Whether it’s OK for CGI to generate dwarfs in films or if dwarf acting roles should go to actual dwarves, whether it’s OK for Black Frenchmen to play traditionally White characters in The Beauty and the Beast, whether it was OK for Ariel to be African-American in the remake of The Little Mermaid, etc.
  6. Whether police officers and prisons should accommodate Muslims’ religious dietary requirements (no pork, fasting during Ramadan), similar to how Jews’ and vegans’ requirements are often accommodated.
  7. Whether it was OK for an activist artist to starve piglets to death in order to encourage scrutiny of the factory farming system.
  8. Whether the international community should provide aid to Afghanistan in order to help its citizens receive health care and food, or whether aid should be withheld in order to pressure the Taliban to improve conditions for women and girls.
  9. Whether the new “Golden Visa” program allowing foreign nationals to purchase U.S. residency and a path to citizenship for $1-5 million should be continued or ended.
  10. Whether it’s OK to sentence murderers who commit their crimes at age 20 or 19 to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
  11. Whether more states should allow people to choose to “compost” their bodies in lieu of cremation or traditional burial.
  12. Whether it’s OK to require tourists to conduct community service or pay extra fees in order to visit crowded sites to reduce (or at least receive compensation for) over-toured sites.
  13. Whether killers of women should receive harsher sentences or whether “femicide” should be discouraged by addressing root causes that make women vulnerable such as improving access to education and small business loans, or programs encouraging  men to better value and respect women.
  14. Whether it was OK for a town in Michigan to ban all political and ideology flags on public property as a way to diffuse tensions between the conservative Muslim majority and the LGBTQ+ community.
  15. Whether paid surrogate mothering should be allowed across borders (wealthy couples hiring surrogates in poorer countries, for example).
  16. Whether it’s OK for a zoo to solicit aging pets to use as food for exotic animals.
  17. Whether it’s OK to allow AI-generated likenesses of murder victims to “testify” at their killers’ sentencing hearings.
  18. Whether prison visitors should be allowed to meet in person with their loved ones or only allowed to interact via webcam.
  19. Whether it’s OK to edit genes in heritable ways (so the changes don’t simply impact that person, but their offspring and the broader human gene pool).
  20. Whether a park trail should be paved so it’s more accessible to persons in wheelchairs or left unpaved in order to better protect the natural habitat.
  21. Whether a lady should tell her roommate that the man the roommate’s dating was previously married and has a child.
  22. Whether it’s OK for snack food manufacturers to modify their portions to better attract consumers on new GLP-1 weight loss drugs.
  23. Whether it’s OK for the Amish to pull their kids from school after the 8th grade.
  24. Whether it’s OK to use brain implants to improve one’s competitive video game playing abilities.
  25. Whether to limit or endorse AI as a personal therapist.
  26. Whether Home Owners Associations that impose fines on residents for using unapproved decorations or failing to care for their yard are OK.

Whether a political minority group in Sri Lanka should… I’m not sure. My team found IEB case 6: Tamil Autonomy especially technical and dense, and the moral upshot seemed to focus on whether a minority group should push for national independence. If you understand that case better than we do, please volunteer to write a guest case analysis! I’m sure other teams are struggling with it as well.

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New In-Class Ethics Bowl Resources from PLATO

Pre-college philosophy O.G. Jana Mohr Lone recently reached out to share a new Ethics Bowl Start-Up Kit created and curated by our friends at PLATO, the Philosophy Learning and Teaching Organization.

Designed to empower teachers to begin hosting Ethics Bowls in their classrooms ASAP, the description concisely explains what Ethics Bowl is, the lesson plan outlines the main steps, the rules confirm expectations, the rubric and scoresheet ensure judges are aligned, and the moderator script helpfully distinguishes what should be said aloud in red from context and instructions in black. For example, “Both teams now have up to 2 minutes to confer before they will engage in an open dialogue. Give the teams two minutes to confer. If they go to two minutes, tell them that time is up.”

PLATO has so many wonderful resources, and is leading the nation in promoting Ethics Bowls on the middle and elementary school levels in the U.S. Jana’s actually PLATO’s Executive Director, teaches philosophy for the University of Washington, and in 2012 published a book on my personal bookshelf, The Philosophical Child. Thank you, Jana and team for all you’ve done and are doing, including creating and sharing the new Ethics Bowl Start-Up Kit! It’s now permanently linked here on EthicsBowl.org’s Resources page.

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2025-2026 NHSEB Regional Case 5 Grade Expectations

I sometimes use AI to plan my philosophy classes. Should I feel guilty? Should I disclose it to my students? Should I stop?

NHSEB case five is all about educators using AI. One college student catches her professor using it to create presentation slides, which is extra scandalous because the professor had forbidden their students from using AI in their class. Another student catches their professor using AI to not only grade their essay, but to generate feedback.

Like most issues, educators using AI would probably be more or less OK given the details. We’d need to ask separately, is it OK for teachers to use AI to help prepare their lecture notes? To brainstorm assignments? Draft exam questions? What about grading? Would a teacher’s experience and background make a difference (consider a 1st-year trainee vs. a 20th year leader in their field)? Would the subject make a difference (algebra vs. English, physics vs. philosophy)? Would the grading method matter? Multiple choice bubble sheets have made teachers’ lives easier via auto-grading since the 70s. Today, online learning platforms do the same. However, while Scantron machines can score multiple choice answers, they’re incapable of analyzing narrative essays. BrightSpace’s auto-grading features can’t author tailored feedback (not yet, anyway). But modern gen AI can.

One relevant factor concerns consistency, for teachers might have some obligation to practice what they preach. In deciding whether an educator should or shouldn’t use AI, and whether they should close doing so if they do, their own demands to and expectations for their students would seem to make a difference. For example, below is a note included in my college philosophy class syllabi, followed by a prompt I recently gave ChatGPT in preparing for a class on Aristotle’s political philosophy.

Professor Matt’s Syllabus AI Note: You’re welcome and encouraged to use generative AI as a personal tutor on any topic we cover. If you’ve not dabbled with ChatGPT (it’s free), start before the world leaves you behind. However, on all graded assignments, do your own reading, thinking, writing and test-taking. In other words, ask AI questions you’d ask me, such as, “I read x article and I think the author was arguing y. Is that right?” Then ask follow ups. “Ok. But what about the section where he mentions z? That seems inconsistent with his overall view.” Really, it’s a wonderful on-demand, free personal tutor. Use it for that purpose alone and you’ll speed your learning and amplify your skill. Use it as a CheatBot to do your work for you and you’ll wind up no smarter than when you arrived, and ashamed of rather than proud of your diploma. If you have any questions about legit vs. not legit usage of AI in my class, please ask.

And the prompt I gave ChatGPT, then used to develop an in-class exercise: I’m teaching a class on Aristotle’s thoughts on the role of the state in nurturing flourishing. It’s on a brief selection where he suggests marriage and birthing ages, what women should do while pregnant, and also how kids should be shielded from corrupting images and plays. What might be some good class exercises to complement that?

Interestingly, one of ChatGPT’s suggestions was an Ethics Bowl case! It was on various state’s attempts to age check internet pornography viewers, which tied beautifully to Aristotle’s strict guidance on what kids should and shouldn’t consume. I decided to use it, and after some initial blushing, discussions went quite well.

However, I didn’t disclose that I got the idea from ChatGPT. My students know I love Ethics Bowl and we use cases often, so no one questioned it. But should I feel sneaky about consulting with a chatbot to supplement and improve my teaching? It could be subconscious rationalization, but I wouldn’t think so, because I wouldn’t feel an obligation to disclose other class prep strategies, either. For example, if I had gotten the Ethics Bowl pornography age verification case idea from a philosophy colleague, I wouldn’t have felt compelled to share. “This wasn’t my idea, but Dr. Bock’s.” If I had come across the idea in an issue of Teaching Ethics, I wouldn’t have, either. Similarly, when I consult with AI, yet use my human judgment to decide and customize what the class does, that feels like a praiseworthy rather than shameful act. It confirms that I want my students to have an enjoyable, worthwhile experience, and that I’m willing to invest extra time to ensure they do. And since I’m balancing obligations to my student with obligations to others (to play with and be a good dad to my kids, to devote time and attention to my wife, to do a little to better the world by promoting Ethics Bowl), being a better professor faster by leveraging AI seems OK.

That said, I heavily customized the assignment, had already created my own lecture notes based on my direct reading of the passage, and picked out a brief video to watch. It’s not like this was a new subject to me or I had AI generate a full script which I followed word-for-word. That would have been dishonest and irresponsible since AI tends to “hallucinate” (get things wrong).

Also, as you read above, I encourage my students to use AI as a personal tutor and thought partner. If I enforced a strict student AI ban (or tried to enforce one—preventing and proving AI abuse is very difficult), secretly using it myself would indeed seem hypocritical. But perhaps since I’m already an expert in my field and they’re still learning, it could be OK for me to use external resources, yet insist my students not? Maybe.

Cool, timely topic—thank you, case committee! Below is a study guide from coach Michael Andersen. Between it and the kickstart ideas above, coaches, teams, and judges should have more than enough to make quality progress on this one. And don’t neglect overlap with regional case 10: Calling Dr. Alexa, on the benefits, drawbacks, permissibility, and risks of using AI as a personal therapist. I’m less enthusiastic about current AI’s potential in that area, but you be the judge.

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Brand New Ethics Bowl Documentary

“The Bowl” is a new upbeat documentary by Ethereal Films and lead filmmaker Eli Yetter-Bowman that the Ethics Bowl community will be able to use as a recruitment tool for years to come. It’s already received screening requests from 40+ institutions including Stanford and Harvard. And this wasn’t something thrown together by an outsider—Eli has volunteered as an Ethics Bowl judge for the past decade, fully gets Ethics Bowl’s mission and value, and beautifully conveys its draw in the film. According to the filmmakers’ website, spreading the good news about Ethics Bowl is the whole idea.

“We want to drastically expand awareness and participation of the program to schools across the US. It already exists as an amazing resource to support young people but the program lacks mass communication/representation to attract more schools. Further, we believe this type of program offers value for people of all kinds so a secondary goal is to encourage this type of thinking across society in general.”

While full release will come through PBS sometime in 2026, I was granted an advance viewing opportunity and loved it. The Bowl follows a HSEB team from North Carolina to the National Championships at UNC, inviting viewers to share in their excitement, anxieties, thrills, and disappointments. A talented and thoughtful group of young women, coached by an understanding and understated teacher, the team navigates preparation stress, post-round regrets, and the added weirdness of being filmed.

I interviewed Yetter-Bowman and will share our exchange in an upcoming post. But for now, check out the trailer and consider helping spread the word with your coaches, judges, moderators, teams, friends, colleagues, and network. And if your school, nonprofit or business might be interested in an institutional license, simply fill out the form on the film’s project page. School libraries often have budgets for this sort of thing and may take care of the rest if you ask yours nicely.

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2025-2026 NHSEB Regional Case 11 Calling Dr. Alexa

With strong similarities to last season’s “My Pal Hal,” NHSEB regional case 11 is about using AI for psychological support. In “Calling Dr. Alexa,” high school senior Grace uses an AI therapy app to abate stress caused by high-pressure studies and the drama of navigating her transition into adulthood. While a personal psychologist would be nice, the app is on-demand 24 hours per day and much more affordable, so Grace uses it regularly. She feels like it’s helping, but worries the guidance she’s receiving might be cookie-cutter slop, and also that the intimate details she shares could one day be exposed.

There are many angles at team could take in analyzing this one, but there’s some overlap with my team’s thoughts on case 5. “Grade Expectations” is about educators leveraging AI for lesson prep and even grading, which might be hypocritical if they’ve banned student AI use or simply less effective than 100% human teaching. When we discussed it, my team thought there was something morally relevant about their shared desire to have their schoolwork thoughtfully engaged by another human mind, as opposed to an unthinking algorithm. However, what if algorithms were proven to achieve better learning outcomes in terms of higher test scores? The third discussion question for “Calling Dr. Alexa” broaches this “better outcomes using AI than humans” possibility.

Discussion Question 3: If an AI system reliably outperforms average therapists on key outcomes, is there still a moral reason to prefer human care for some patients?

In crafting this question, the case committee thoughtfully included the phrases “moral reason” and “some patients” to ensure teams think through a finely nuanced answer. But this alludes to an important consideration when it comes to preferring human versus AI labor in many contexts. Currently, it’s probably not the case that AI does a better job than average human therapists. But as AI improves, that could soon change, assuming we could agree on standards (patient self-reports of contentment, reduced need for prescriptions, etc.). And if/when that time comes, would we still have a moral reason to prefer human care for some patients? Similarly, if an AI system reliably outperformed average educators on key outcomes, might we conclude similarly? What about human engineers, human clergy, human politicians?

Happy discussing! Below is a superb study guide from superstar coach Michael Andersen, so generously shared for the global Ethics Bowl community.

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2025-2026 NHSEB Case 15 Dead Men DO Tell Tales

Footage of murder victim Chris Pelkey played in court during sentencing of his killer

This past May, a judge in Arizona viewed AI-generated “testimony” from murder victim Chris Pelkey during the sentencing of his killer. If you watch the video above, you’ll see that the technology is pretty basic. It’s Mr. Pelkey’s likeness and apparent voice, which is confirmed with included footage recorded prior to his death. But the special effects aren’t seamless – it’s pretty obvious it’s a deepfake, which makes sense since Mr. Pelkey had been killed four years prior.

Interestingly, Mr. Pelkey’s likeness speaks of mercy and forgiveness. He says that he and his killer might have been friends in another life. And at the end, there’s footage of him fishing, suggesting a peaceful afterlife. Rather than his avatar’s script being generated by AI, it was written by his sister who had been thinking about what she’d say in her post-trial sentencing impact statement for at least two years. In crafting the script, she interviewed Mr. Pelkey’s elementary schoolteachers, his prom date, fellow Army servicemembers, friends, and other family.

My team discussed this case briefly, and one worry was that judges might put more stock in testimony of this nature than is deserved. We can’t know for sure what murder victims might have wanted. Judges realize this, but might be inappropriately swayed to grant more weight to speculation from an AI-generated video figure as opposed to a family member. In this case, Mr. Pelkey’s avatar suggested a possible desire for leniency. But there’s no reason to think that would always be the case were this to become common practice. And perhaps driven by the Mr. Pelkey’s avatar’s warmth and personability, the judge ultimately sentenced his killer to 10.5 years in prison, which was 1 year more than prosecutors requested.

Further, as broached by the case writers, usage of speculative testimony from a deceased victim opens the door to using the same from deceased, uncooperative, or hard-to-locate witnesses. A prosecutor or defense attorney could imagine what a witness might have said were they able to testify (and probably imagine testimony that would be most helpful for their case), and pass off hearsay as firsthand testimony using a similar AI-avatar technique. The jury could be reminded that such a deepfake witness wasn’t real. But they’d likely still be more emotionally swayed than warranted.

As you continue to think about the stakeholders, benefits, drawbacks and risks of allowing deepfakes in the courtroom, work through coach Michael Andersen’s excellent study guide below, which includes a link to a Court TV interview with Mr. Pelkey’s sister.

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2025-2026 IEB Regionals Case 1 and NHSEB Regionals Case 12 A Pound of Flesh

Discussion on the proposal featuring two former prisoners – clip from Coach Michael’s attached study guide

IEB case 1 and NHSEB case 12, “A Pound of Flesh” (yep, same case) is about the Massachusetts legislature’s proposal to knock time off of prisoners’ sentences in exchanged for organ and bone marrow donations. We could put “donations” in scare quotes because depending on their environment, incarcerated individuals may not be making sufficiently free choices. But that’s just one factor to consider – here are several more based on discussions with my IEB and NHEB teams, followed by an excellent study guide by coach Michael Andersen. If you’re open to sharing your thoughts on this case, please share in a comment.

  • The proposed law would cap sentence reductions at 1 year, presumably awarding more time off for more invasive/dangerous/long-term detrimental donations and/or more needed organs.
  • There’s a shortage of organs for certain minority groups, and this program could rectify that unfairness, making it less difficult for minorities in need to receive an organ.
  • Any reduction in criminals’ sentences could be perceived to dishonor their victims or victims’ loved ones.
  • Allowing inmates to donate organs could serve their rehabilitation and inspire additional character growth, igniting a habit of giving and expanding their concern for others.
  • Such donations could be likened to organ selling given prisoners’ less than ideal circumstances, but we typically endorse monetary compensation for blood and gamete donations, as well as for surrogate mothering, so this wouldn’t necessarily render the practice unacceptable (though there are differences – blood regenerates and wombs can gestate multiple times, whereas kidneys do not grow back).

Finally, something my teams didn’t consider, but The Young Turk commentators brought up in one of the clips shared in coach Michael ‘s study guide below, is that were this proposal to become law, there’s a risk that sentences might become longer or prison conditions worse in order to coerce more “donations.” Hopefully the prisons system would not do this. But given the unmet needs of many waiting for various transplants, it’s definitely a risk.

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Ethics Bowl at Concerned Philosophers for Peace Conference

Fellow Pellissippi State Community College philosophy professor Court Lewis and I had a great time talking about Ethics Bowl’s potential for promoting domestic and international peace at the annual conference of the Concerned Philosophers for Peace over the weekend. Hosted by Texas State University in San Marcos and attended by scholars from all over the world including Poland, Albania, Australia, Canada, and India, with two speakers Zooming in live from Ecuador and Mali (Africa), roughly a third of the audience was already involved with Ethics Bowl (no surprise, right?), and the rest were inspired by Ethics Bowl’s focus on collaboration, mutual respect, principled solutions, and proactive engagement with a reasonable critic.

As we know, while traditional debate artificially divides participants into hostile factions, orders them to think and argue a particular close-minded way, and forbids them from agreeing, Ethic Bowl empowers teams to take ownership of their views, to cooperatively balance their moral intuitions against the best ethical arguments, to remain open to the possibility that they might have more to learn, and to view the other team as equals and thought partners rather than enemies. Ethics Bowl’s reasonable, elevated, conciliatory style paired with accelerating growth around the world, makes it a natural and powerful ally of anyone seeking principled peace.

Many thanks to CPP leadership and conference organizers for welcoming the discussion. And be on the lookout for a longer post at the Blog of the American Philosophical Association soon.

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2025-2026 NHSEB Regionals Case 3 Public Record, Private Lives

Case 3 in the NHSEB case set winds up being largely about interpersonal ethics, but begins with a privacy policy frame. Coach Michael Andersen in Washington shared the below excellent study guide, which recommends the above excellent privacy-related video by Ethics Bowl researcher and advocate Michael Vazquez at UNC. My team discussed the case week before last, then revisited it briefly last week after watching the video – excellent context which helped sharpen their view. Thanks to both Michaels!

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Critique Ethics Bowl to the Rescue at the St. Louis APPE March 2026?

*10/22/2025 Update: two volunteers have stepped forward – thank you, Greg Bock and Tammy Cowart of UT-Tyler’s Center for Ethics!*

As an applied ethicist, the Association for Practical and Professional Ethics’s annual conference is the most intellectually satisfying gathering I’ve had the pleasure to attend. My first was in grad school around 2007 (it seems there were several in Cincinnati back then), and it’s always a pleasure to return, especially since the meeting coincides with IEB nationals. You’re among some of the most serious ethicists from across the country (and sometimes from around the world), as well as many of the most dedicated Ethics Bowl organizers, coaches, judges, and participants.

The 2026 APPE conference will be in St. Louis March 5-8. I plan to be there and use the opportunity to not only catch excellent paper presentations, attend a few IEB nationals rounds, and say hi to old friends, but to share my new book. What better audience for Ethics Bowl to the Rescue than professional ethicists and regional Ethics Bowl champs? And a great way for any author to share their work at an APPE meeting is to host an “Author Meets Critics” session.

If you live nearby, can acquire travel sponsorship, or were planning to attend anyway, I need a couple of thoughtful critics, and I’ll make your job super easy. Just email matt (at) mattdeaton.com to confirm your interest, I’ll send you a copy of the book and several ideas. For example:

  1. The book’s title suggests something Ethics Bowl cannot deliver—a fast and certain “rescue” from our perilous situation.
  2. Deaton repeatedly invokes Socrates throughout the book—on the cover, in the opening chapter, in the Bowls Behind Bars chapter, in the closing chapter—yet presents arguments that are not as rigorous as Socrates himself would have endorsed.
  3. Ethics Bowl’s peaceful, conciliatory approach to difficult moral and political issues is apt to be taken advantage of by unscrupulous political extremists and therefore ought not be encouraged – Ethics Bowlers ought to be joining debaters rather than the other way around.
  4. Recruiting ethicists, philosophers, and ethics-minded debaters to join the Ethics Bowl movement risks diverting energy more desperately needed on the front lines of the fight for democracy and justice.
  5. Deaton’s aggressive denunciation of traditional debate is too heavy-handed and apt to alienate more debaters that it recruits.
  6. In vigorously advocating for Ethics Bowl and at times attacking and demeaning traditional debate, Deaton adopts what he claims to be arguing to supplant – an attack-style debate-like approach.
  7. While Deaton claims to be a serious ethicist and friend of high moral standards, he mentions several behaviors unbecoming of a moral exemplar, including:
    • Training martial arts, which are violent
    • Driving an F-150 across the country, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions
    • Recommending that Ethics Bowl teams and educators learn to use AI as a coach and thought partner, completely neglecting AI’s extreme power consumption and potential impact on the environment

I have responses to the above, but not all will be fully satisfactory, and I’m OK with that. The book wasn’t intended to be a bulletproof philosophical argument, but an Ethics Bowl recruiting tool, which means in many cases readability, personability, and entertainment overrode logical rigor.

Really, it’s ripe for critique. So if you’re up for joining my Author Meets Critics session at the 2026 APPE conference next March in St. Louis, let’s do it!