I’m mostly-deontologist and don’t think the paralysis argument works, but I also don’t think the way most people live is a good counterargument to it. I don’t think so because MacAskill is arguing against a coherent moral worldview, whereas hardly any people live according to a coherent moral worldview. Them not being paralysed is, I think, not because they have a much more refined version of deontology than what MacAskill argues against, but because they don’t have a coherent version of it at all.
Edit: I’ll rephrase—I think it’s good to improve our morals and our adherence to them, but achieving a fully coherent moral theory is unrealistic and probably impossible.
I’m mostly-deontologist and don’t think the paralysis argument works, but I also don’t think the way most people live is a good counterargument to it. I don’t think so because MacAskill is arguing against a coherent moral worldview, whereas hardly any people live according to a coherent moral worldview. Them not being paralysed is, I think, not because they have a much more refined version of deontology than what MacAskill argues against, but because they don’t have a coherent version of it at all.
I don’t think incoherence is much of a problem.
Edit: I’ll rephrase—I think it’s good to improve our morals and our adherence to them, but achieving a fully coherent moral theory is unrealistic and probably impossible.
Just look around.
Edited to maybe make it clearer what I mean.
Thanks, appreciate it! :)