To a donor who would like to save lives in the present without worsening the long-term future, however, we may just have reduced moral cluelessness enough for them to feel comfortable donating bednets.
I have to admit I find this slightly bizarre. Such a person would accept that we can improve/worsen the far future in expectation and that the future has moral value. At the same time, such a person wouldn’t actually care about improving the far future, they would simply not want to worsen it. I struggle to understand the logic of such a view.
They might not be willing to commit 100% to EV maximization no matter how low the probability of making a difference, but entertain EV maximization as one of multiple views over which they have decision-theoretic (normative) uncertainty. Then they want to ensure their actions look good across views they find plausible. That being said, I think it’s the entire portfolio that matters and you would want to be robustly positive over the combined portfolio, not on each individual act in it.
Also, they might think no far future-targeted option looks robustly positive in expectation.
I have to admit I find this slightly bizarre. Such a person would accept that we can improve/worsen the far future in expectation and that the future has moral value. At the same time, such a person wouldn’t actually care about improving the far future, they would simply not want to worsen it. I struggle to understand the logic of such a view.
They might not be willing to commit 100% to EV maximization no matter how low the probability of making a difference, but entertain EV maximization as one of multiple views over which they have decision-theoretic (normative) uncertainty. Then they want to ensure their actions look good across views they find plausible. That being said, I think it’s the entire portfolio that matters and you would want to be robustly positive over the combined portfolio, not on each individual act in it.
Also, they might think no far future-targeted option looks robustly positive in expectation.