Yes, I do think this: “Not optimistic longtermism is at least just as evolutionarily debunkable as optimistic longtermism.”
That’s what I think our prior should be, and generally we shouldn’t accept evolutionary debunking arguments for moral beliefs unless there’s actual findings in evolutionary psychology that suggest evolutionary pressure is the best explanation for them. I think it’s indeed trivially easy to come up with some story for why any given belief is subject to evolutionary debunking, but these stories are so easy to come up with that they provide essentially no meaningful evidence that the debunking is warranted, unless further substantiated.
E.g., I think the claim that pessimistic longtermism is evolutionarily selected for, because it would cause people to care more about their own families and kin than about far-off generations, is at least as plausible as your claim about optimistic longtermism. Or we might think agnostic longtermism is selected for, because we’re cognitive misers and thinking about the long-term future is too intensive and not decision relevant to be selected for. In fact, I think none of these claims is very plausible at all, because I don’t think it’s likely evolution is selecting for these kinds of beliefs at this level of detail.
My argument about neutrality toward creating lives also counts against your claim, because if it were true that there was evolutionary pressure toward pro-natalist, optimistic longtermism, I would predict we’d not see intuitions for neutrality about creating future lives be so prevalent. But they are prevalent, so this is another reason I don’t think your claim is plausible.
I think the claim that pessimistic longtermism is evolutionarily selected for, because it would cause people to care more about their own families and kin than about far-off generations
Wait sorry, what? No, it would cause people to work on making the future smaller or reduce s-risks or something. Pessimistic longtermists are still longtermists. They do care about far-off generations. They just think it’s ideally better if they don’t exist.[1]
Having clarified that, do you really not find optimistic longtermism more evolutionarily adaptive than pessimistic longtermism? (Let’s forget about agnosticism, here, for simplicity). I mean, the former says “save humanity and increase population size” and the latter says the exact opposite. I find it hard not to think the former favors survival and reproduction more than the latter, all else equal, such that it is more likely to be selected for.
Is it just that we had different definitions of pessimistic longtermism in mind? (I should have been clearer, sorry.)
And btw, this is not necessarily due to them making different moral assumptions than optimistic longtermists. The disagreement might be purely empirical.
What a belief implies about what someone does depends on many other things, like other beliefs and their options in the world. If, e.g., there are more opportunities to work on x-risk reduction than s-risk reduction, then it might be true that optimistic longtermists are less likely than pessimsitic longtermists to form families (because they’re more focused on work) than pessimistic longtermists.
Having clarified that, do you really not find optimistic longtermism more evolutionarily adaptive than pessimistic longtermism?
As my answer made clear, the point I really want to emphasise is that this feels like an absurd exercise — there’s no reason to believe that longtermist beliefs are heritable or selected for in our ancestral environment.
Oh ok so our disagreement is on whether concern for the long-term future needs to be selected for for evolution to “directly” (in the same sense you used it earlier) influence longtermists’ beliefs on the value of X-risk reduction and making the future bigger, right?
Yes, I do think this: “Not optimistic longtermism is at least just as evolutionarily debunkable as optimistic longtermism.”
That’s what I think our prior should be, and generally we shouldn’t accept evolutionary debunking arguments for moral beliefs unless there’s actual findings in evolutionary psychology that suggest evolutionary pressure is the best explanation for them. I think it’s indeed trivially easy to come up with some story for why any given belief is subject to evolutionary debunking, but these stories are so easy to come up with that they provide essentially no meaningful evidence that the debunking is warranted, unless further substantiated.
E.g., I think the claim that pessimistic longtermism is evolutionarily selected for, because it would cause people to care more about their own families and kin than about far-off generations, is at least as plausible as your claim about optimistic longtermism. Or we might think agnostic longtermism is selected for, because we’re cognitive misers and thinking about the long-term future is too intensive and not decision relevant to be selected for. In fact, I think none of these claims is very plausible at all, because I don’t think it’s likely evolution is selecting for these kinds of beliefs at this level of detail.
My argument about neutrality toward creating lives also counts against your claim, because if it were true that there was evolutionary pressure toward pro-natalist, optimistic longtermism, I would predict we’d not see intuitions for neutrality about creating future lives be so prevalent. But they are prevalent, so this is another reason I don’t think your claim is plausible.
Wait sorry, what? No, it would cause people to work on making the future smaller or reduce s-risks or something. Pessimistic longtermists are still longtermists. They do care about far-off generations. They just think it’s ideally better if they don’t exist.[1]
Having clarified that, do you really not find optimistic longtermism more evolutionarily adaptive than pessimistic longtermism? (Let’s forget about agnosticism, here, for simplicity). I mean, the former says “save humanity and increase population size” and the latter says the exact opposite. I find it hard not to think the former favors survival and reproduction more than the latter, all else equal, such that it is more likely to be selected for.
Is it just that we had different definitions of pessimistic longtermism in mind? (I should have been clearer, sorry.)
And btw, this is not necessarily due to them making different moral assumptions than optimistic longtermists. The disagreement might be purely empirical.
What a belief implies about what someone does depends on many other things, like other beliefs and their options in the world. If, e.g., there are more opportunities to work on x-risk reduction than s-risk reduction, then it might be true that optimistic longtermists are less likely than pessimsitic longtermists to form families (because they’re more focused on work) than pessimistic longtermists.
As my answer made clear, the point I really want to emphasise is that this feels like an absurd exercise — there’s no reason to believe that longtermist beliefs are heritable or selected for in our ancestral environment.
Oh ok so our disagreement is on whether concern for the long-term future needs to be selected for for evolution to “directly” (in the same sense you used it earlier) influence longtermists’ beliefs on the value of X-risk reduction and making the future bigger, right?