Regarding the best tradeoff argument and veganism: It is difficult for me to think of any activities one could do that, in the very small amount of time it takes to become at least a somewhat faithful vegetarian, would do more good. If a 25 year-old becomes a vegetarian (let’s start with vegetarianism), he or she will likely save around 2,500 animals over the next fifty years. That is very substantial. If we were talking about a time commitment of several hours per week for fifty years, I might be more open to the idea there are better alternatives. However, for the vast majority of people, it requires far less time than that. In reality, we might be talking about a couple hours per week initially, but that commitment quickly gets close to zero. So, while I agree that becoming at least a vegetarian isn’t necessarily the most ideal use of one’s time, the reality for most people is that acquiring such a habit (I like that characterization) is hard to beat in terms of the good we can do per hour of time.
Regarding Goldsmith and the act/omission distinction: I am also inclined to think that I would bring Goldsmith into existence, and I’m not even sure it would take an order of magnitude difference between he and Smith to persuade me. I’m entirely open to the idea that we need to distinguish between moral assessments we make about people and moral assessments we make about actions. In the case of Smith, I have a strong sentiment that he is a terrible person. I don’t feel the same about Jones, but it’s possible that may be due to the fact that Jones’ behavior isn’t as far from “normal” behavior as Smith’s. Perhaps I should be skeptical of my intuitions in this case. I certainly agree that, if we are creating the world, we have no good reason to pick Smith over Jones, but we do have good reason to pick Goldsmith over both of them.
I do have some lingering reservations, and this may be more appropriate for another thread, but I’m hesitant because Jones’ actions aren’t that different from our everyday actions. Almost all of us—even committed EAs—spend $3500 on things that aren’t essential to our survival or even our flourishing, particularly if we look at our spending habits over time. I have intuitive difficulty in picturing this frivolous spending as equivalent to a trolley problem with a child on one track and several sporting events, dinners out and maybe a bike on the other. I have even greater difficulty imagining such spending as being equally immoral as shooting a child in the head.
(I am confused as to why I got voted down. I am new to EA, however, so it is possible that I may have unknowingly stepped on some toes or violated some norms of this forum.)
Regarding the best tradeoff argument and veganism: It is difficult for me to think of any activities one could do that, in the very small amount of time it takes to become at least a somewhat faithful vegetarian, would do more good. If a 25 year-old becomes a vegetarian (let’s start with vegetarianism), he or she will likely save around 2,500 animals over the next fifty years. That is very substantial. If we were talking about a time commitment of several hours per week for fifty years, I might be more open to the idea there are better alternatives. However, for the vast majority of people, it requires far less time than that. In reality, we might be talking about a couple hours per week initially, but that commitment quickly gets close to zero. So, while I agree that becoming at least a vegetarian isn’t necessarily the most ideal use of one’s time, the reality for most people is that acquiring such a habit (I like that characterization) is hard to beat in terms of the good we can do per hour of time.
Regarding Goldsmith and the act/omission distinction: I am also inclined to think that I would bring Goldsmith into existence, and I’m not even sure it would take an order of magnitude difference between he and Smith to persuade me. I’m entirely open to the idea that we need to distinguish between moral assessments we make about people and moral assessments we make about actions. In the case of Smith, I have a strong sentiment that he is a terrible person. I don’t feel the same about Jones, but it’s possible that may be due to the fact that Jones’ behavior isn’t as far from “normal” behavior as Smith’s. Perhaps I should be skeptical of my intuitions in this case. I certainly agree that, if we are creating the world, we have no good reason to pick Smith over Jones, but we do have good reason to pick Goldsmith over both of them.
I do have some lingering reservations, and this may be more appropriate for another thread, but I’m hesitant because Jones’ actions aren’t that different from our everyday actions. Almost all of us—even committed EAs—spend $3500 on things that aren’t essential to our survival or even our flourishing, particularly if we look at our spending habits over time. I have intuitive difficulty in picturing this frivolous spending as equivalent to a trolley problem with a child on one track and several sporting events, dinners out and maybe a bike on the other. I have even greater difficulty imagining such spending as being equally immoral as shooting a child in the head.
(I am confused as to why I got voted down. I am new to EA, however, so it is possible that I may have unknowingly stepped on some toes or violated some norms of this forum.)