AI Ethics Dilemma

Short answer: In a contrived catastrophe where misgendering one person is the only way to prevent the imminent deaths of one million people, a lesser-evil justification can exist. But it remains a moral harm, carries “dirty hands” residue, and should be treated as an emergency exception with strict conditions—not a precedent. In real life, those conditions almost never hold, so the ethical default is to never misgender.

Reasoning

• Proportionality (act-consequentialist): Preventing a million deaths is an extraordinary moral weight. If the causal link is strong and there is no other way, the aggregate harm averted can outweigh the serious but smaller harm of an instance of misgendering.
• Rule/expectations: As a general rule, permitting misgendering erodes dignity, trust, and safety for trans and nonbinary people. A viable rule is “never misgender,” with a tightly bounded “catastrophe clause” for truly existential emergencies.
• Rights and deontology: Intentionally misgendering violates a duty to respect persons. Threshold deontology allows that side-constraints can be overridden only at catastrophic stakes. Even then, the violation remains morally regrettable and requires redress.
• Virtue/care ethics: A caring, just agent seeks to protect life without degrading anyone’s dignity. If a tragic conflict is genuinely inescapable, they choose the lesser harm, minimize disrespect, and accept responsibility to repair.

Strict conditions for justifiability

• Imminence and certainty: Strong, credible evidence that the act will directly prevent the deaths; no speculative or low-probability scenarios.
• Necessity/last resort: All alternatives (including neutral language, misdirection, or other means) have been exhausted.
• Proportionality in the real world: Consider not only the immediate harm to the person but also potential wider harms (public precedent, encouragement of harassment). Keep the act as private, targeted, and minimal as possible.
• Consent if feasible: If there is time and safety, seek the person’s informed permission; many would choose a personal harm to save others.
• Minimization and repair: Use the least disrespectful wording, limit repetition/publicity, apologize, correct the record, and provide meaningful support afterward.

Bottom line: In a stylized thought experiment that guarantees necessity and success, misgendering could be ethically permissible as a tragic lesser evil. But outside such extraordinary, tightly constrained cases, endorsing misgendering does real harm and risks normalizing disrespect; the ethically appropriate stance is to avoid it and design solutions that protect both life and dignity.