Hi Julia. Thank you for your charity in our previous interactions.
Please let me know how you feel my comment puts words in people’s mouths. I’ll happily fix or retract any part of that comment which is misleadingly put.
It implies that Will and Toby believe that preventing the creation of a happy person is as bad as killing them. I think that’s pretty unlikely, because most people who value future lives think murdering an existing person is a lot worse than not creating a life.
I don’t think my statement that Will and Toby “place moral weight” on the non-person-affecting view implies that they accept all of its conclusions. The statement I made is corroborated by Will and Toby’s own words.
Toby, in collaboration with Hilary Greaves, argues that moral uncertainty “systematically pushes one towards choosing the option preferred by the Total and Critical Level views” as a population’s size increases.[1] If Toby accepts his own argument, this means Toby places moral weight on total utilitarianism, which implies the non-person-affecting view.
Will spends most of Chapter 8 What We Owe The Future arguing that “all proposed defences of the intuition of neutrality [i.e. person-affecting view] suffer from devastating objections”.[2] Will states that “the view that I incline towards” is to “accept the Repugnant Conclusion”.[3] The most parsimonious view which accepts the Repugnant Conclusion is total utilitarianism, so it’s unsurprising Will endorses Hilary and Toby’s placing of moral weight on total utilitarianism to “end up with a low but positive critical level”.[4]
I don’t think Will and Toby believe that preventing the creation of a happy person is as bad as killing them. (Although I do personally think that’s the logical conclusion of their arguments.) The statement I actually made, that Will and Toby “place moral weight” on that view, seems consistent with their writings and worldviews.
>I’m not sure supporters of non-person-affecting views would endorse this exact claim
I’d put it more strongly—I think the original comment puts words in people’s mouths that I don’t think they mean at all.
Hi Julia. Thank you for your charity in our previous interactions.
Please let me know how you feel my comment puts words in people’s mouths. I’ll happily fix or retract any part of that comment which is misleadingly put.
It implies that Will and Toby believe that preventing the creation of a happy person is as bad as killing them. I think that’s pretty unlikely, because most people who value future lives think murdering an existing person is a lot worse than not creating a life.
Thanks for the clarification!
I don’t think my statement that Will and Toby “place moral weight” on the non-person-affecting view implies that they accept all of its conclusions. The statement I made is corroborated by Will and Toby’s own words.
Toby, in collaboration with Hilary Greaves, argues that moral uncertainty “systematically pushes one towards choosing the option preferred by the Total and Critical Level views” as a population’s size increases.[1] If Toby accepts his own argument, this means Toby places moral weight on total utilitarianism, which implies the non-person-affecting view.
Will spends most of Chapter 8 What We Owe The Future arguing that “all proposed defences of the intuition of neutrality [i.e. person-affecting view] suffer from devastating objections”.[2] Will states that “the view that I incline towards” is to “accept the Repugnant Conclusion”.[3] The most parsimonious view which accepts the Repugnant Conclusion is total utilitarianism, so it’s unsurprising Will endorses Hilary and Toby’s placing of moral weight on total utilitarianism to “end up with a low but positive critical level”.[4]
I don’t think Will and Toby believe that preventing the creation of a happy person is as bad as killing them. (Although I do personally think that’s the logical conclusion of their arguments.) The statement I actually made, that Will and Toby “place moral weight” on that view, seems consistent with their writings and worldviews.
Greaves, Hilary; Ord, Toby, ‘Moral uncertainty about population ethics’, Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, https://philpapers.org/rec/GREMUA-2
MacAskill, W. (2022). What We Owe the Future (p. 250). Basic Books. p. 234
Ibid. p. 245
Ibid. p. 250