Thanks. I take you to say roughly that you have certain core beliefs that you’re unwilling to compromise on, even if you can’t justify those beliefs philosophically. And also that you think it’s better to be upfront about that than invent justifications that aren’t really load-bearing for you. (Let me know if that’s a misrepresentation.)
I think it’s virtuous that you’re honest about why you disagree (“I place much lower weight on animals”) and I think that’s valuable for discourse in that it shows where the disagreement lies. I don’t have any objection to that. But I also think that saying you just believe that and can’t/won’t justify it (“I cannot give a tight philosophical defence of that view, but I am more committed to it than I am to giving tight philosophical defences of views”) is not particularly valuable for discourse. It doesn’t create any opening for productive engagement or movement toward consensus. I don’t think it’s harmful exactly, I just think more openness to examining whether the intuition withstands scrutiny would be more valuable.
(That is a question about discourse. I think there’s also a separate question about the soundness of the decision procedure you described in your original comment. I think it’s unsound, and therefore instrumentally irrational, but I’m not the rationality police so I won’t get into that.)
Thanks. I take you to say roughly that you have certain core beliefs that you’re unwilling to compromise on, even if you can’t justify those beliefs philosophically. And also that you think it’s better to be upfront about that than invent justifications that aren’t really load-bearing for you. (Let me know if that’s a misrepresentation.)
I think it’s virtuous that you’re honest about why you disagree (“I place much lower weight on animals”) and I think that’s valuable for discourse in that it shows where the disagreement lies. I don’t have any objection to that. But I also think that saying you just believe that and can’t/won’t justify it (“I cannot give a tight philosophical defence of that view, but I am more committed to it than I am to giving tight philosophical defences of views”) is not particularly valuable for discourse. It doesn’t create any opening for productive engagement or movement toward consensus. I don’t think it’s harmful exactly, I just think more openness to examining whether the intuition withstands scrutiny would be more valuable.
(That is a question about discourse. I think there’s also a separate question about the soundness of the decision procedure you described in your original comment. I think it’s unsound, and therefore instrumentally irrational, but I’m not the rationality police so I won’t get into that.)