Hi Bruce, I think your concern boils down to a semantic disagreement on the definition of âvoluntaryâ in this case. If we are one among many providers of service X, and we decide to stop providing, is that an intervention which involuntarily prevents peopleâs access to that service?
I think the relevant semantic disagreement is: My view is that if provider of service X is targeted at women who do not want children, then changes to provision of service X is irrelevant to âa case for voluntary abortion reductionâ, because by decreasing provision of service X, you havenât made it so these women are voluntarily wanting more children /â less abortions, youâve just made it so they have less of a choice, whereas it seems like you disagree.
It sounds like Iâm misunderstanding you though, so perhaps itâs more useful if you clarify /â define what you mean by âvoluntary abortion reductionâ.
you havenât made it so these women are voluntarily wanting more children /â less abortions, youâve just made it so they have less of a choice, whereas it seems like you disagree.
Thatâs a compelling distinction! Iâm better understanding what you mean now. We can narrow the set of interventions which affect a service down to three types:
Voluntary: The service remains the same, but users of the service are incentivized to change their behavior.
Voluntary?: Some providers stop offering the service, but the service remains available with other providers.
Involuntary: All providers stop offering the service.
Iâm keeping the situation abstract as a service to try to show why I think the âVoluntary?â type is distinct from the involuntary type.
Would advocating for a platform to reduce hate speech impressions be an involuntary imposition on free speech? They can always use a different platform.
Would a doctor personally deciding to not perform abortions be an involuntary imposition on abortion seekers? They can always find another doctor.
Would a wedding planning company deciding to not plan weddings for homophobes be an involuntary imposition on homophobe weddings? They can always find another wedding planner.
What you have convinced me on is that the âVoluntary?â type is more gray area than I thought. However, I still donât think any of the situations I enumerated should count as involuntary impositions.
The two commonsense relevant definitions of âvoluntaryâ youâll find in the dictionary are âof oneâs own free willâ and âin the absence of payment.â
Reducing funding for abortion services may in some cases cause people to choose to carry a pregnancy to term when could have still obtained an abortion, perhaps by exerting more effort or taking on more risk. Since they were not paid to not have an abortion, I suppose it is technically âvoluntarilyâ in the second sense, in the same way that criminalizing homosexuality caused people to âvoluntarilyâ have less homosexual sex.
While I grant you the benefit of the doubt, I tend to see this kind of subtle misuse of language in a native English speaker (as I assume you are?) as a deliberate obfuscating move rather than a slip-up, so you may want to reconsider your linguistic choices in the future to avoid creating that impression.
I think more to your point, there is a difference between âfreedom fromâ and âfreedom to,â or positive and negative rights. Many people feel people should have freedom from being legally prevented from seeking an abortion, but not necessarily that we should subsidize their ability to have an abortion. I read your post as about eliminating subsidies for family planning, as well as encouraging voluntary increased child rearing.
I strongly disagree with the comparison between (a) proposals to suspend EA funding for services which reduce the amount of future people and (b) criminalizing homosexuality.
I donât think thereâs any âsubtle misuse of languageâ which causes one to be anywhere near the other. Isnât the comparison between (a) and any of the analogues I gave in my above comment far more natural? How are any of those anywhere near criminalizing homosexuality? If anything, comparing (a) to criminalizing homosexuality could constitute a âdeliberate obfuscating move.â
I think weâre both acting in good faith here, and Iâm willing to admit a passion for this cause which can affect the impartiality with which I react to comments. All I can say is that I really donât see things that way, and I donât think thereâs anything unreasonable about recognizing (a) and (b) as fundamentally different.
Would a doctor personally deciding to not perform abortions be an involuntary imposition on abortion seekers? They can always find another doctor.
It sounds like the crux here is the extent to which these women have many options RE: access to safe abortion servicesâthis could be an involuntary imposition if theyâre the only doctor in a 100km radius, for example, or if other doctors are so busy they donât have time to look after additional patients.
Itâs also not all-or-nothing, it could be the case that there are many other doctors, but only one doctor with the skill to perform abortions, or many other doctors accessible by car but not by foot etc, or doctors available but are less affordable.
Unfortunately, the bar is much higher on your end, because if only a minority of women who previously were using service X now no longer have an alternative, this would be an involuntary imposition on this small minority, so if youâre suggesting that âany involuntary intervention is out of scopeâ, then youâd also have to show that all users of service X have similar access to a functional equivalent. I donât know if this is the case personally, but it would surprise me if the charityâs nonexistence did not change the number of women with access to family planning /â abortion. Presumably if this were the case, these charities would be working in a fairly non-neglected context, and thus not worth funding purely on cost-effectiveness /â neglectedness considerations.
It sounds like the crux here is the extent to which these women have many options RE: access to safe abortion services
Yes, I think this is close to the consensus on definition weâre reaching. The only quibble I have with this is that I think the level of âobligationâ on the service provider to provide a service is also relevant.
The publishing platform has no obligation to host content it considers hate speech.
The anti-abortion doctor has no obligation to perform abortions.
The homophobe-phobic wedding planning company has no obligation to plan any particular personâs wedding.
Similarly, I donât think EA can be said to have an âobligationâ to provide funding for any particular cause, unless that cause is clearly and unambiguously more important than EAâs erstwhile top priorities. In that regard, I donât think that a proposal to withdraw EA funding for some service constitutes an involuntary imposition on the serviceâs recipients, especially given conditional on the option that the recipients can procure the service in other ways.
Thanks for the engagement! Thereâs a lot going on here. Responding first to:
especially given that the recipients can procure the service in other ways.
Iâm just noting that your comment on the recipients being able to procure services elsewhere is prefaced with the word âespeciallyâ, and not something like âconditional onâ. This implies that the ability of the recipients being able to procure services elsewhere is not a necessary factor of determining whether this constitutes a voluntary or involuntary imposition.
So if youâre saying something like âBecause EAs donât have an obligation to provide funding to any cause, no withdrawal for funding can constitute an involuntary imposition on the serviceâs recipients, irrespective of whether these women have other options availableâ then this is something I pretty strongly disagree with. It seems to me that what EA fundersâ moral obligations are here are either irrelevant or vastly dominated by the experience of the recipient when deciding whether this action contributes to a voluntary reduction in abortion or an involuntary reduction?
From the perspective of a pregnant woman seeking abortion, they donât care about what the EA funderâs obligation are. All she knows is that last year her friend had access to affordable abortion services, and this year she doesnât have the same choice. I donât really understand how this could be really considered meaningfully voluntary, even if she decides to keep the baby instead of try a dangerous DIY method at home (though clearly, many women will do this).
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In that regard, I donât think that a proposal to withdraw EA funding for some service constitutes an involuntary imposition on the serviceâs recipients, especially given that the recipients can procure the service in other ways.
More generally, it might be true that recipients can procure the services in other ways, but Iâd like to see this claim actually justified for the charities that you are suggesting should have their funding suspended, or added as a caveat above (âconditional on these recipients being able to access the same quality of care elsewhere at no meaningful cost...etc), alongside the other philosophical caveats youâve provided.
Otherwise itâs an open Q whether the recipients can in fact procure the services in other ways, what costs they may have to bear in order to do so (also see above RE: the bar being higher on your end in terms of showing that such recommendations for suspensions result in no involuntary impositions), and whether this harm is worth the benefits it brings, especially considering 2nd order considerations such as those raised by a commentor above.
Iâm pretty hesitant to update in your direction until I see at least an attempt at quantifying this.
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For what itâs worth, most of this message above and an earlier comment was me going along with your usage of the terms voluntary /â involuntary, but I think this is actually quite a misleading use of these terms. (Mainly in response to your comment RE: âconsensus on definitionâ, as I donât want to give the impression I am endorsing this definition, but just that I am trying to understand it more clearly). That being saidâIâm not suggesting you are being intentionally misleading!
Hypothetical analogy: suppose you think higher homelessness rates are better. Suppose you know that thereâs a subset of researchers who applied for funding from EA sources because they wanted a way to pay rent. Would you say that because EA funders have no obligation to provide funding for any cause, that such a withdrawal of funding, for the purpose of increasing homelessness rates (and against your best guess for what the researcher would want for themselves), would be appropriately classified as âincreasing voluntary homelessnessâ?
By your usage of voluntary and involuntary, this would depend on whether or not they could find a source of $ elsewhere. But I think my original interpretation is that even if you showed me that these researchers could find $ elsewhere for rent, it would still be inaccurate for this suspension of funding to be classified as âincreasing voluntary homelessnessâ, because the mechanism by which this increases homelessness is decreased access to alternatives, not because it is empowering people to make the choice of becoming homeless because they wish to be for their own reasons. (This doesnât at all interact with the possibility that suspension of funding is the right call for other reasons, e.g. if their research isnât adding a lot of value, or if this isnât neglected because they have many other funding options available).
I hope this illustrates my concern with the âsuspending fundingâ recommendation based on âvoluntary abortion reductionâ arguments. (i.e. I think the definitions you use are contrary to my best guess of what most people would interpret as âvoluntary abortion reductionâ, but even by your own definition, you provide pretty limited support for the extent to which other options are available).
I think that the main relevant question in determining whether the abortion reduction is voluntary or not should be: âAre the women in question making a well-informed, uncoerced choice that keeping the baby is preferable to a safe abortion, or are the women in question âchoosingâ to keep the baby because there are limited alternatives available to them?â
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The anti-abortion doctor has no obligation to perform abortions.
Minor nitpick: Iâm not sure if youâre talking about a moral or legal obligation here, and I guess it may vary by jurisdiction, but itâs not as clear cut as written here. When a doctor conscientiously objects to providing a service (i.e. refuse to provide a service that is against their personal values), thereâs a clear case to be made that it is the doctorâs professional obligation to let the patients know what options they have available and how they can access this care from other doctors who can provide this service, such that their personal values do not not meaningfully impact their patientsâ health outcomes and access to treatment. And if there are no other options available, and conscientious objection will compromise healthcare delivery then this may be unacceptable.
I agree that a charity /â EA funding may not be held to the same standard as a medical doctor in terms of moral obligations, but the same thought process is relevant in terms of taking into account how much harm you may be contributing to in expectation. To reiterate though, the extent to which EA funders or doctors are obligated to provide this service is (imo) not particularly relevant to whether or not the women in question are now voluntarily choosing not to have abortions.
(btw the disagree votes on your comments in this thread arenât coming from me)
On âespecially,â yep, that was an incorrect use of words, and Iâve edited my comment accordingly. Thanks for pointing that out!
Based on your considerations, and after thinking about it some more, I retract the âobligationâ point, and now agree that the fact that weâre not âobligatedâ to fund this cause doesnât make the downstream effects of the funding redirection âvoluntaryâ or âinvoluntaryâ for the recipients.
it might be true that recipients can procure the services in other ways, but Iâd like to see this claim actually justified for the charities that you are suggesting should have their funding suspended
Of the charities I mentioned, to the best of my knowledge, only PSI actually provides abortions. DMI and FEM run media campaigns encouraging contraception. MHI connects women with contraception access. On DMI, FEM, and MHI, Calum suggests that the unmet need for contraception due to lack of access is quite low, and supports his suggestion pretty well IMO.
I think PSI is where your point is strongest, since it seems very difficult to rule out the possibility that there exists some place where PSI is the only abortion provider. However, PSI is not an EA charity, and it seems very unlikely that removing its recommendation from The Life You Can Saveâs website would cause it to stop being able to offer its services where thereâs the greatest unredirectable demand.
As for whether or not the interventionâs harm is worth the benefits it brings, Iâd like to point out that this concern is orthogonal to the question of whether or not the intervention could be considered âvoluntary.â That said, I would say yes, and thatâs the reasoning I use to recommend it.
[homelessness analogy]...the definitions you use are misleading and contrary to my best guess to what most people would interpret as âvoluntary abortion reductionâ
Your homelessness analogy is a good one, and it does accurately show how my use of the term âvoluntaryâ could have been misleading. I have some regrets about the whole structure of my post in that regard. I reply to Julia Wiseâs similar concern here, which might help explain much more about my thought process.
(btw the disagree votes arenât coming from me)
No worries! I used to go on Reddit often, and as you can imagine from our interactions, I was prone to getting heavily downvoted :P To avoid motivated/âemotion-driven âreasoningâ, I made a personal rule to never downvote anyone on Reddit for any reason. Iâm off Reddit now, but Iâve always maintained the rule that I never downvote respectful discourse. I think engagement is better than a disagree-vote, and strive to avoid the latter in favor of the former.
To close (as frankly, thereâs only so much brainpower Iâm willing to extend on this semantic consideration), I maintain that the interventions I suggest would be the right thing to do. However, thereâs a sensible case that there are reasonable definitions of âvoluntaryâ which readers understandably presuppose when reading the post for which the interventions donât qualify. Though I maintain that there are senses in which they do qualify, I think youâve made an excellent case that thereâs substantial ambiguity there which can blindside readers. Iâd appreciate if you read my reply to Julia Wiseâs similar concern (which helps to spell my actual intention behind the post), and let me know what you think would be the best way to disambiguate while staying true to the postâs scope.
Thanks! Happy to see real-time updates on the internet.
I did see Calumâs papersâI didnât reply because I didnât have time to meaningfully engage with all those sources, and it looked like others replied first. There were some info that surprised me, but on a very brief skim, I donât know if those sources actually bring me to the conclusion of:
Moreover, the unmet need for contraception in developing countries is also pretty low, and the proportion of this which is due to lack of access is very smallâso the number of women not using contraception because they lack access to it is pretty miniscule.
RE: harm vs benefit tradeoff, I agree that this is basically irrelevant in terms of whether this is voluntary or not, though it is relevant in terms of deciding whether or not I should accept the suggestion at face value.
To close (as frankly, thereâs only so much brainpower Iâm willing to extend on this semantic consideration), I maintain that the interventions I suggest would be the right thing to do.
Makes sense RE: capacity. Yeah, Iâm not engaging with whether this is the right thing to do, all things consideredâyou could make a case for example that money spent on these charities could plausibly be better spent elsewhere, though to be clear, I would personally find it pretty aversive to justify this primarily because we wanted higher rates of unwanted pregnancies to increase population size. Iâm mainly suggesting that even if you think this is the right thing to do, it shouldnât be considered âvoluntary abortion reductionâ for the reasons I illustrate above.
RE: your response to Juliaâs, Iâll add a quick comment in that thread.
Hi Bruce, I think your concern boils down to a semantic disagreement on the definition of âvoluntaryâ in this case. If we are one among many providers of service X, and we decide to stop providing, is that an intervention which involuntarily prevents peopleâs access to that service?
I think the relevant semantic disagreement is:
My view is that if provider of service X is targeted at women who do not want children, then changes to provision of service X is irrelevant to âa case for voluntary abortion reductionâ, because by decreasing provision of service X, you havenât made it so these women are voluntarily wanting more children /â less abortions, youâve just made it so they have less of a choice, whereas it seems like you disagree.
It sounds like Iâm misunderstanding you though, so perhaps itâs more useful if you clarify /â define what you mean by âvoluntary abortion reductionâ.
Thatâs a compelling distinction! Iâm better understanding what you mean now. We can narrow the set of interventions which affect a service down to three types:
Voluntary: The service remains the same, but users of the service are incentivized to change their behavior.
Voluntary?: Some providers stop offering the service, but the service remains available with other providers.
Involuntary: All providers stop offering the service.
Iâm keeping the situation abstract as a service to try to show why I think the âVoluntary?â type is distinct from the involuntary type.
Would advocating for a platform to reduce hate speech impressions be an involuntary imposition on free speech? They can always use a different platform.
Would a doctor personally deciding to not perform abortions be an involuntary imposition on abortion seekers? They can always find another doctor.
Would a wedding planning company deciding to not plan weddings for homophobes be an involuntary imposition on homophobe weddings? They can always find another wedding planner.
What you have convinced me on is that the âVoluntary?â type is more gray area than I thought. However, I still donât think any of the situations I enumerated should count as involuntary impositions.
The two commonsense relevant definitions of âvoluntaryâ youâll find in the dictionary are âof oneâs own free willâ and âin the absence of payment.â
Reducing funding for abortion services may in some cases cause people to choose to carry a pregnancy to term when could have still obtained an abortion, perhaps by exerting more effort or taking on more risk. Since they were not paid to not have an abortion, I suppose it is technically âvoluntarilyâ in the second sense, in the same way that criminalizing homosexuality caused people to âvoluntarilyâ have less homosexual sex.
While I grant you the benefit of the doubt, I tend to see this kind of subtle misuse of language in a native English speaker (as I assume you are?) as a deliberate obfuscating move rather than a slip-up, so you may want to reconsider your linguistic choices in the future to avoid creating that impression.
I think more to your point, there is a difference between âfreedom fromâ and âfreedom to,â or positive and negative rights. Many people feel people should have freedom from being legally prevented from seeking an abortion, but not necessarily that we should subsidize their ability to have an abortion. I read your post as about eliminating subsidies for family planning, as well as encouraging voluntary increased child rearing.
I strongly disagree with the comparison between (a) proposals to suspend EA funding for services which reduce the amount of future people and (b) criminalizing homosexuality.
I donât think thereâs any âsubtle misuse of languageâ which causes one to be anywhere near the other. Isnât the comparison between (a) and any of the analogues I gave in my above comment far more natural? How are any of those anywhere near criminalizing homosexuality? If anything, comparing (a) to criminalizing homosexuality could constitute a âdeliberate obfuscating move.â
I think weâre both acting in good faith here, and Iâm willing to admit a passion for this cause which can affect the impartiality with which I react to comments. All I can say is that I really donât see things that way, and I donât think thereâs anything unreasonable about recognizing (a) and (b) as fundamentally different.
I think this is a useful clarification, thanks.
It sounds like the crux here is the extent to which these women have many options RE: access to safe abortion servicesâthis could be an involuntary imposition if theyâre the only doctor in a 100km radius, for example, or if other doctors are so busy they donât have time to look after additional patients.
Itâs also not all-or-nothing, it could be the case that there are many other doctors, but only one doctor with the skill to perform abortions, or many other doctors accessible by car but not by foot etc, or doctors available but are less affordable.
Unfortunately, the bar is much higher on your end, because if only a minority of women who previously were using service X now no longer have an alternative, this would be an involuntary imposition on this small minority, so if youâre suggesting that âany involuntary intervention is out of scopeâ, then youâd also have to show that all users of service X have similar access to a functional equivalent. I donât know if this is the case personally, but it would surprise me if the charityâs nonexistence did not change the number of women with access to family planning /â abortion. Presumably if this were the case, these charities would be working in a fairly non-neglected context, and thus not worth funding purely on cost-effectiveness /â neglectedness considerations.
Yes, I think this is close to the consensus on definition weâre reaching. The only quibble I have with this is that I think the level of âobligationâ on the service provider to provide a service is also relevant.
The publishing platform has no obligation to host content it considers hate speech.
The anti-abortion doctor has no obligation to perform abortions.
The homophobe-phobic wedding planning company has no obligation to plan any particular personâs wedding.
Similarly, I donât think EA can be said to have an âobligationâ to provide funding for any particular cause, unless that cause is clearly and unambiguously more important than EAâs erstwhile top priorities. In that regard, I donât think that a proposal to withdraw EA funding for some service constitutes an involuntary imposition on the serviceâs recipients,
especially givenconditional on the option that the recipients can procure the service in other ways.Edit: Altered incorrect language
Thanks for the engagement! Thereâs a lot going on here. Responding first to:
Iâm just noting that your comment on the recipients being able to procure services elsewhere is prefaced with the word âespeciallyâ, and not something like âconditional onâ. This implies that the ability of the recipients being able to procure services elsewhere is not a necessary factor of determining whether this constitutes a voluntary or involuntary imposition.
So if youâre saying something like âBecause EAs donât have an obligation to provide funding to any cause, no withdrawal for funding can constitute an involuntary imposition on the serviceâs recipients, irrespective of whether these women have other options availableâ then this is something I pretty strongly disagree with. It seems to me that what EA fundersâ moral obligations are here are either irrelevant or vastly dominated by the experience of the recipient when deciding whether this action contributes to a voluntary reduction in abortion or an involuntary reduction?
From the perspective of a pregnant woman seeking abortion, they donât care about what the EA funderâs obligation are. All she knows is that last year her friend had access to affordable abortion services, and this year she doesnât have the same choice. I donât really understand how this could be really considered meaningfully voluntary, even if she decides to keep the baby instead of try a dangerous DIY method at home (though clearly, many women will do this).
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More generally, it might be true that recipients can procure the services in other ways, but Iâd like to see this claim actually justified for the charities that you are suggesting should have their funding suspended, or added as a caveat above (âconditional on these recipients being able to access the same quality of care elsewhere at no meaningful cost...etc), alongside the other philosophical caveats youâve provided.
Otherwise itâs an open Q whether the recipients can in fact procure the services in other ways, what costs they may have to bear in order to do so (also see above RE: the bar being higher on your end in terms of showing that such recommendations for suspensions result in no involuntary impositions), and whether this harm is worth the benefits it brings, especially considering 2nd order considerations such as those raised by a commentor above.
Iâm pretty hesitant to update in your direction until I see at least an attempt at quantifying this.
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For what itâs worth, most of this message above and an earlier comment was me going along with your usage of the terms voluntary /â involuntary, but I think this is actually quite a misleading use of these terms. (Mainly in response to your comment RE: âconsensus on definitionâ, as I donât want to give the impression I am endorsing this definition, but just that I am trying to understand it more clearly). That being saidâIâm not suggesting you are being intentionally misleading!
Hypothetical analogy: suppose you think higher homelessness rates are better. Suppose you know that thereâs a subset of researchers who applied for funding from EA sources because they wanted a way to pay rent. Would you say that because EA funders have no obligation to provide funding for any cause, that such a withdrawal of funding, for the purpose of increasing homelessness rates (and against your best guess for what the researcher would want for themselves), would be appropriately classified as âincreasing voluntary homelessnessâ?
By your usage of voluntary and involuntary, this would depend on whether or not they could find a source of $ elsewhere. But I think my original interpretation is that even if you showed me that these researchers could find $ elsewhere for rent, it would still be inaccurate for this suspension of funding to be classified as âincreasing voluntary homelessnessâ, because the mechanism by which this increases homelessness is decreased access to alternatives, not because it is empowering people to make the choice of becoming homeless because they wish to be for their own reasons. (This doesnât at all interact with the possibility that suspension of funding is the right call for other reasons, e.g. if their research isnât adding a lot of value, or if this isnât neglected because they have many other funding options available).
I hope this illustrates my concern with the âsuspending fundingâ recommendation based on âvoluntary abortion reductionâ arguments. (i.e. I think the definitions you use are contrary to my best guess of what most people would interpret as âvoluntary abortion reductionâ, but even by your own definition, you provide pretty limited support for the extent to which other options are available).
I think that the main relevant question in determining whether the abortion reduction is voluntary or not should be: âAre the women in question making a well-informed, uncoerced choice that keeping the baby is preferable to a safe abortion, or are the women in question âchoosingâ to keep the baby because there are limited alternatives available to them?â
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Minor nitpick: Iâm not sure if youâre talking about a moral or legal obligation here, and I guess it may vary by jurisdiction, but itâs not as clear cut as written here. When a doctor conscientiously objects to providing a service (i.e. refuse to provide a service that is against their personal values), thereâs a clear case to be made that it is the doctorâs professional obligation to let the patients know what options they have available and how they can access this care from other doctors who can provide this service, such that their personal values do not not meaningfully impact their patientsâ health outcomes and access to treatment. And if there are no other options available, and conscientious objection will compromise healthcare delivery then this may be unacceptable.
I agree that a charity /â EA funding may not be held to the same standard as a medical doctor in terms of moral obligations, but the same thought process is relevant in terms of taking into account how much harm you may be contributing to in expectation. To reiterate though, the extent to which EA funders or doctors are obligated to provide this service is (imo) not particularly relevant to whether or not the women in question are now voluntarily choosing not to have abortions.
(btw the disagree votes on your comments in this thread arenât coming from me)
On âespecially,â yep, that was an incorrect use of words, and Iâve edited my comment accordingly. Thanks for pointing that out!
Based on your considerations, and after thinking about it some more, I retract the âobligationâ point, and now agree that the fact that weâre not âobligatedâ to fund this cause doesnât make the downstream effects of the funding redirection âvoluntaryâ or âinvoluntaryâ for the recipients.
Of the charities I mentioned, to the best of my knowledge, only PSI actually provides abortions. DMI and FEM run media campaigns encouraging contraception. MHI connects women with contraception access. On DMI, FEM, and MHI, Calum suggests that the unmet need for contraception due to lack of access is quite low, and supports his suggestion pretty well IMO.
I think PSI is where your point is strongest, since it seems very difficult to rule out the possibility that there exists some place where PSI is the only abortion provider. However, PSI is not an EA charity, and it seems very unlikely that removing its recommendation from The Life You Can Saveâs website would cause it to stop being able to offer its services where thereâs the greatest unredirectable demand.
As for whether or not the interventionâs harm is worth the benefits it brings, Iâd like to point out that this concern is orthogonal to the question of whether or not the intervention could be considered âvoluntary.â That said, I would say yes, and thatâs the reasoning I use to recommend it.
Your homelessness analogy is a good one, and it does accurately show how my use of the term âvoluntaryâ could have been misleading. I have some regrets about the whole structure of my post in that regard. I reply to Julia Wiseâs similar concern here, which might help explain much more about my thought process.
No worries! I used to go on Reddit often, and as you can imagine from our interactions, I was prone to getting heavily downvoted :P To avoid motivated/âemotion-driven âreasoningâ, I made a personal rule to never downvote anyone on Reddit for any reason. Iâm off Reddit now, but Iâve always maintained the rule that I never downvote respectful discourse. I think engagement is better than a disagree-vote, and strive to avoid the latter in favor of the former.
To close (as frankly, thereâs only so much brainpower Iâm willing to extend on this semantic consideration), I maintain that the interventions I suggest would be the right thing to do. However, thereâs a sensible case that there are reasonable definitions of âvoluntaryâ which readers understandably presuppose when reading the post for which the interventions donât qualify. Though I maintain that there are senses in which they do qualify, I think youâve made an excellent case that thereâs substantial ambiguity there which can blindside readers. Iâd appreciate if you read my reply to Julia Wiseâs similar concern (which helps to spell my actual intention behind the post), and let me know what you think would be the best way to disambiguate while staying true to the postâs scope.
Thanks! Happy to see real-time updates on the internet.
I did see Calumâs papersâI didnât reply because I didnât have time to meaningfully engage with all those sources, and it looked like others replied first. There were some info that surprised me, but on a very brief skim, I donât know if those sources actually bring me to the conclusion of:
RE: harm vs benefit tradeoff, I agree that this is basically irrelevant in terms of whether this is voluntary or not, though it is relevant in terms of deciding whether or not I should accept the suggestion at face value.
Makes sense RE: capacity. Yeah, Iâm not engaging with whether this is the right thing to do, all things consideredâyou could make a case for example that money spent on these charities could plausibly be better spent elsewhere, though to be clear, I would personally find it pretty aversive to justify this primarily because we wanted higher rates of unwanted pregnancies to increase population size. Iâm mainly suggesting that even if you think this is the right thing to do, it shouldnât be considered âvoluntary abortion reductionâ for the reasons I illustrate above.
RE: your response to Juliaâs, Iâll add a quick comment in that thread.