I find these discussions of moral offsets somewhat disturbing, re: Tom_Davidson’s third point. Can we host a dog fighting ring at EA Global next year as long as half the buy-in goes to the Humane League? Can we get trafficked children to cook our food as long as we give a nice plump sum to SCI?
I think the analysis is fine, and it’s good to know the real impact of certain actions (like going vegan). But then to take it a step further and say, well, I can just skip acting morally in this case and offset that with a donation seems to miss the mark. How far are we willing to go, as a community, down this road, and where do we draw the line?
The only clear and decisive way out is to accept that your life should be maximally ethical. So you shouldn’t go around pursuing wanton acts of vice, but you should make whatever decisions are necessary to maximize your overall ethical productivity.
Most people who go vegetarian find its very very little effort to be 90% vegetarian after a year or so. To me this warns against the view that people will give extra because “they haven’t made the sacrifice of becoming veggie”. Very soon the sacrifice becomes a habit and the claim that charitable donations are affected becomes even less plausible.
I’d be interested to know if anyone has given more money because of this thread. I know that i’m more willing to eat diary products and have read others saying it made them happier eating meat.
I find these discussions of moral offsets somewhat disturbing, re: Tom_Davidson’s third point. Can we host a dog fighting ring at EA Global next year as long as half the buy-in goes to the Humane League? Can we get trafficked children to cook our food as long as we give a nice plump sum to SCI?
I think the analysis is fine, and it’s good to know the real impact of certain actions (like going vegan). But then to take it a step further and say, well, I can just skip acting morally in this case and offset that with a donation seems to miss the mark. How far are we willing to go, as a community, down this road, and where do we draw the line?
The only clear and decisive way out is to accept that your life should be maximally ethical. So you shouldn’t go around pursuing wanton acts of vice, but you should make whatever decisions are necessary to maximize your overall ethical productivity.
Most people who go vegetarian find its very very little effort to be 90% vegetarian after a year or so. To me this warns against the view that people will give extra because “they haven’t made the sacrifice of becoming veggie”. Very soon the sacrifice becomes a habit and the claim that charitable donations are affected becomes even less plausible.
I’d be interested to know if anyone has given more money because of this thread. I know that i’m more willing to eat diary products and have read others saying it made them happier eating meat.