I meant strong relative to “internal moral disharmony.” But also, am I to understand people are reading the label of “schizophrenia” as an accusation? It’s a disorder that one gets through no choice of one’s own: you can’t be blamed for having it. Hypocrisy, as I understand it, is something we have control over and therefore are responsible for avoiding or getting rid of in ourselves.
At most Stocker is blaming Consequentialism and DE for being moral schizophrenia inducing. But it’s the theory that’s at fault, not the person who suffers it!
Yeah I think this is fair. I probably didn’t read you very carefully or fairly. However, it is hard to control connotations of words, and I have to admit I had a slightly negative visceral reaction for what I believed to be my sincerely held moral views (that I tried pretty hard to live up to, and I made large sacrifices for) medicalized and dismissed so casually.
On my end, I’m sorry if my words sounded too strong or emotive.
Separately, I strongly disagree that we suffer from overthinking ethical stuff too much. I don’t think SBF’s problems with ethics came from careful debate in business ethics and then missing a decimal point in the relevant calculations. I would guess that if he actually consulted senior EA leaders or researchers on the morality of his actions, this would predictably have resulted in less fraud.
No worries about the strong response – I misjudged how my words would be interpreted. I’m glad we sorted that out.
Regarding overthinking ethical stuff and SBF: Unfortunately I fear you’ve missed my point. First of all, I wasn’t really talking about any fraud/negligence that he may have committed. As I said in the 2nd paragraph:
Regarding his ignorance and his intentions, he might be telling the truth. Suppose he is: suppose he never condoned doing sketchy things as a means he could justify by some expected greater good. Where then is the borderline moral nihilism coming from? Note that it’s saying “all the right shibboleths” that he spoke of as mere means to an end, not the doing of sketchy things.
My subject was his attitude/comments towards ethics. Second, my diagnosis was not that:
SBF’s problems with ethics came from careful debate in business ethics and then missing a decimal point in the relevant calculations.
My point was that it’s getting too comfortable approaching ethics like a careful calculation that can be dangerous in the first place – no matter how accurate the calculation is. It’s not about missing some decimal points. Please reread this section if you’re interested. I updated the end of it with a reference to a clear falsifiable claim.
Fwiw I consider “hypocrisy” to be a much weaker accusation than “schizophrenia”
I meant strong relative to “internal moral disharmony.” But also, am I to understand people are reading the label of “schizophrenia” as an accusation? It’s a disorder that one gets through no choice of one’s own: you can’t be blamed for having it. Hypocrisy, as I understand it, is something we have control over and therefore are responsible for avoiding or getting rid of in ourselves.
At most Stocker is blaming Consequentialism and DE for being moral schizophrenia inducing. But it’s the theory that’s at fault, not the person who suffers it!
Yeah I think this is fair. I probably didn’t read you very carefully or fairly. However, it is hard to control connotations of words, and I have to admit I had a slightly negative visceral reaction for what I believed to be my sincerely held moral views (that I tried pretty hard to live up to, and I made large sacrifices for) medicalized and dismissed so casually.
Yikes! Thank you for letting me know! Clearly a very poor choice of words: that was not at all my intent!
To be clear, I agree with EAs on many many issues. I just fear they suffer from “overthinking ethical stuff too often” if you will.
Thanks for responding! (upvoted)
On my end, I’m sorry if my words sounded too strong or emotive.
Separately, I strongly disagree that we suffer from overthinking ethical stuff too much. I don’t think SBF’s problems with ethics came from careful debate in business ethics and then missing a decimal point in the relevant calculations. I would guess that if he actually consulted senior EA leaders or researchers on the morality of his actions, this would predictably have resulted in less fraud.
Meta: I couldn’t figure out why the first chart renders with so much whitespace.
No worries about the strong response – I misjudged how my words would be interpreted. I’m glad we sorted that out.
Regarding overthinking ethical stuff and SBF:
Unfortunately I fear you’ve missed my point. First of all, I wasn’t really talking about any fraud/negligence that he may have committed. As I said in the 2nd paragraph:
My subject was his attitude/comments towards ethics. Second, my diagnosis was not that:
My point was that it’s getting too comfortable approaching ethics like a careful calculation that can be dangerous in the first place – no matter how accurate the calculation is. It’s not about missing some decimal points. Please reread this section if you’re interested. I updated the end of it with a reference to a clear falsifiable claim.