Since youâve indicated youâre not interested in a debate, please donât feel that this is directed at you. But as a general point:
I think extreme ideas get disproportionate attention compared to the amount of action people actually take on them. EAs are a lot more likely than other people to consider whether invertebrates matter, and to have thought about Pascalâs-muggging type situations, but I think mainstream EAs remain pretty unsure about these. In general I think EAs appear a lot weirder because theyâre willing to carefully think through and discuss weird ideas and thought experiments, even if in the end theyâre not persuaded.
Ideas like âbeing willing to cause harm to one person to benefit othersâ sound bad and weird until you consider that people do this all the time. We have fire departments even though we know some fire fighters will die in the line of duty. Emergency room staff triage patients, leaving some to die in order to save others. I wash my toddlerâs hair even though she dislikes it, because the smell will bother people if I donât. Itâs hard to imagine how societies would work if they werenât willing to do things like these.
I think EA has work to do on making clear that weâre not a philosophical monolith, and emphasizing our commonalities with other value systems.
Ideas like âbeing willing to cause harm to one person to benefit othersâ sound bad and weird until you consider that people do this all the time. We have fire departments even though we know some fire fighters will die in the line of duty. Emergency room staff triage patients, leaving some to die in order to save others. I wash my toddlerâs hair even though she dislikes it, because the smell will bother people if I donât.
None of these seem to get at the core part of Lilaâs objection. The firemen volunteered to do the job, understanding the risks. The emergency room might not treat everyone, but thatâs an omission rather than an actâthey donât inflict additional harm on people. People generally think that parents have a wide degree of freedom to judge what is best for their kids, even if the kids disagree, because the parents know more.
However, what Lila is talking about (or at least a Steelman version, I donât want to put words into her mouth) is actively inflicting harm, which would not have occurred otherwise, on someone who has the capacity to rationally consent, but has chosen not to. Utilitarians have a prima facie problem with cases like secretly killing people for their organs. Just because utilitarianism gives the same answer as conventional ethics in other cases doesnât mean there arenât cases where it widely diverges.
Ok, a government drafts some of its residents, against their will, to fight and die in a war that it thinks will benefit its population overall. This seems to be acceptable to typical people if the war is popular enough (look at the vitriol against conscientious objectors during the World Wars).
Many governments abolish conscription over time because citizens precisely donât agree with that (as of 2011, countries with active military forces were roughly split in half between those with some form of conscription or emergency conscription, and those with no conscription even in emergency casesâhttp://ââchartsbin.com/ââview/ââ1887)
Hi Lila,
Since youâve indicated youâre not interested in a debate, please donât feel that this is directed at you. But as a general point:
I think extreme ideas get disproportionate attention compared to the amount of action people actually take on them. EAs are a lot more likely than other people to consider whether invertebrates matter, and to have thought about Pascalâs-muggging type situations, but I think mainstream EAs remain pretty unsure about these. In general I think EAs appear a lot weirder because theyâre willing to carefully think through and discuss weird ideas and thought experiments, even if in the end theyâre not persuaded.
Ideas like âbeing willing to cause harm to one person to benefit othersâ sound bad and weird until you consider that people do this all the time. We have fire departments even though we know some fire fighters will die in the line of duty. Emergency room staff triage patients, leaving some to die in order to save others. I wash my toddlerâs hair even though she dislikes it, because the smell will bother people if I donât. Itâs hard to imagine how societies would work if they werenât willing to do things like these.
I think EA has work to do on making clear that weâre not a philosophical monolith, and emphasizing our commonalities with other value systems.
None of these seem to get at the core part of Lilaâs objection. The firemen volunteered to do the job, understanding the risks. The emergency room might not treat everyone, but thatâs an omission rather than an actâthey donât inflict additional harm on people. People generally think that parents have a wide degree of freedom to judge what is best for their kids, even if the kids disagree, because the parents know more.
However, what Lila is talking about (or at least a Steelman version, I donât want to put words into her mouth) is actively inflicting harm, which would not have occurred otherwise, on someone who has the capacity to rationally consent, but has chosen not to. Utilitarians have a prima facie problem with cases like secretly killing people for their organs. Just because utilitarianism gives the same answer as conventional ethics in other cases doesnât mean there arenât cases where it widely diverges.
Ok, a government drafts some of its residents, against their will, to fight and die in a war that it thinks will benefit its population overall. This seems to be acceptable to typical people if the war is popular enough (look at the vitriol against conscientious objectors during the World Wars).
Many governments abolish conscription over time because citizens precisely donât agree with that (as of 2011, countries with active military forces were roughly split in half between those with some form of conscription or emergency conscription, and those with no conscription even in emergency casesâhttp://ââchartsbin.com/ââview/ââ1887)