Loved this post—reminds me a lot of intractability critiques of central economic planning, except now applied to consequentialism writ large.
I’d be curious if you think a weaker version of the “Prevent Possible Harms” principle would solve the issue—perhaps “Prevent Computably Possible Harms” and “Don’t Prevent Computably Impossible Harms”? Seems possibly related to debates around normative externalism and the extent to which we need our beliefs to be “objective” to be justified.
Yes I think you’re spot on in thinking that my thinking is more externalist, and a lot of longtermist reasoning has a distinctly internalist flavor. But spelling all that out will take even more work!
Loved this post—reminds me a lot of intractability critiques of central economic planning, except now applied to consequentialism writ large.
I’d be curious if you think a weaker version of the “Prevent Possible Harms” principle would solve the issue—perhaps “Prevent Computably Possible Harms” and “Don’t Prevent Computably Impossible Harms”? Seems possibly related to debates around normative externalism and the extent to which we need our beliefs to be “objective” to be justified.
Yes I think you’re spot on in thinking that my thinking is more externalist, and a lot of longtermist reasoning has a distinctly internalist flavor. But spelling all that out will take even more work!