This critique applies only to unspent funds that have not been irretreviably committed and only applies to certain factual scenarios.
I don’t think we have enough information to evaluate this position. In some plausible narratives, the grant funds were straight up stolen from the depositors and given to the grantees. In other words, most or all of the “profits” could just be misappropriated client funds. The fact that FTX handed over the money to grantees doesn’t change that.
If someone steals my car and gives it to their friend for free . . . it’s still my car. The friend is not morally free to decide they would derive much more utility from the car than I would (or realistically, than my insurance company would from not having to pay the claim). Knowingly retaining my car without having provided appropriate value in exchange is just another form of theft.
In those scenarios, the conclusion that the victims should bear the loss leads to a conclusion that it’s OK to retain knowingly stolen funds if the cause is good enough and/or that it is OK to force people to involuntarily donate if the cause is good enough. In my book, it is tantamount to theft—the grantee is acting to continue the initial deprivation by the grantee’s confederate of the victim’s property
If we think it is OK to reduce Joe Crypto’s savings to 50K to avoid disrupting the work funded by FTX grants, have we all reduced our savings to 50K first? I can’t figure out a world where it is morally appropriate for a grantee or EA community member to decide it is OK to involuntarily appropriate Joe’s property on utilitarian grounds without having made an equivalent level of financial sacrifice themselves.
I am aware of the dangers of “you’re not donating enough” type logic. But EA is supposed to be impartial; we are not entitled to demand Joe Crypto make sacrifices for the cause we are not willing ourselves to make. So I think it is an appropriate question to ask here because we are potentially talking about involuntarily taking the money of someone who is less well off than we are without making an equivalent sacrifice ourselves.
Again, there are a number of scenarios in which I don’t think there is a moral obligation to return funds. In particular, if the grant was clean when made, any future bad acts by the grantor can’t retroactively render it the equivalent of stolen property.
For me, it comes down to whether the retention contributes to the social corrosion in a similar manner to the underlying fraud. My intuition is that it does not, and thus the question should be evaluated from the first order utility differences.
I do not think if there was some determination that a grantee had the right to retain the funds that(a) voluntarily relinquishing them to FTX victims would remedy much at all the social corrosion caused by the underlying fraud or (b) that exercising the right to retain would cause further social corrosion. I suppose if I am wrong on either of the points that I might be persuaded.
This critique applies only to unspent funds that have not been irretreviably committed and only applies to certain factual scenarios.
I don’t think we have enough information to evaluate this position. In some plausible narratives, the grant funds were straight up stolen from the depositors and given to the grantees. In other words, most or all of the “profits” could just be misappropriated client funds. The fact that FTX handed over the money to grantees doesn’t change that.
If someone steals my car and gives it to their friend for free . . . it’s still my car. The friend is not morally free to decide they would derive much more utility from the car than I would (or realistically, than my insurance company would from not having to pay the claim). Knowingly retaining my car without having provided appropriate value in exchange is just another form of theft.
In those scenarios, the conclusion that the victims should bear the loss leads to a conclusion that it’s OK to retain knowingly stolen funds if the cause is good enough and/or that it is OK to force people to involuntarily donate if the cause is good enough. In my book, it is tantamount to theft—the grantee is acting to continue the initial deprivation by the grantee’s confederate of the victim’s property
If we think it is OK to reduce Joe Crypto’s savings to 50K to avoid disrupting the work funded by FTX grants, have we all reduced our savings to 50K first? I can’t figure out a world where it is morally appropriate for a grantee or EA community member to decide it is OK to involuntarily appropriate Joe’s property on utilitarian grounds without having made an equivalent level of financial sacrifice themselves.
I am aware of the dangers of “you’re not donating enough” type logic. But EA is supposed to be impartial; we are not entitled to demand Joe Crypto make sacrifices for the cause we are not willing ourselves to make. So I think it is an appropriate question to ask here because we are potentially talking about involuntarily taking the money of someone who is less well off than we are without making an equivalent sacrifice ourselves.
Again, there are a number of scenarios in which I don’t think there is a moral obligation to return funds. In particular, if the grant was clean when made, any future bad acts by the grantor can’t retroactively render it the equivalent of stolen property.
Well argued.
For me, it comes down to whether the retention contributes to the social corrosion in a similar manner to the underlying fraud. My intuition is that it does not, and thus the question should be evaluated from the first order utility differences.
I do not think if there was some determination that a grantee had the right to retain the funds that(a) voluntarily relinquishing them to FTX victims would remedy much at all the social corrosion caused by the underlying fraud or (b) that exercising the right to retain would cause further social corrosion. I suppose if I am wrong on either of the points that I might be persuaded.