Thanks for these caveats! I largely agree, but they seem to only have a modest impact on the 99% claim.
Regarding intertheoretic comparison, my prior is that a person-affecting view (PAV) should have little to no effect on oneâs valuation of welfare. I donât really see why PAV vs non-PAV would radically disagree on how important it is to help others. In this case, the disagreement would indeed have to be radicalâeven if for some reason, PAV caused someone to 10x their valuation of welfare, theyâd still have to be 90% certain PAV was true for FEM to be positive.
For PAVs where value is grounded quite differently, I donât have an informed prior on just how different the PAVâs grounding of value may be. If there are highly supported PAVs where welfare is clearly valued far greater than non-PAV, then that would update the 99% claim. However, I donât know of any such PAV, nor of any non-PAV where welfare is valued far greater than PAV (which would have the opposite effect).
Your second consideration makes sense, and might result in a modest dampening effect on the 99% number, if the increase in mothersâ standard of living due to FEMâs intervention is highly weighed.
Couldnât agree more on the farmed and wild animal effects :) I wonât pretend to have any degree of certainty about how it all shakes out.
Itâs less about valuing individual welfare at a greater rate under PAVs (although that could happen in principle) and more about grounding value in ways that donât allow intertheoretic comparsions at all with total views, or just refusing to attempt such intertheortic comparisons altogether, or refusing to apply MEC using them. It could be like trying to compare temperature and weight, which seems absurd because they measure very different things. Even if the targets are at least superficially similar, like welfare in both cases, the units could still be incompatible, with no justifiable common scale or conversion rate between them.
A person-affecting view could ground value by using a total view-compatible welfare scale and then just restricting its use in a person-affecting way, and that would be a good candidate for a common scale with the total view and so intertheoretic comparsions under MEC in the obvious way: valuing welfare an existing individualâs welfare identically across the views. However, itâs not clear that this is the only plausible or preferred way to ground person-affecting views.
Stepping back, your argument depends on high confidence in multiple controversial assumptions:
the use of MEC at all (possibly alongside other approaches, rather than any other approaches to moral uncertainty not involving MEC, like a moral parliament or a property rights approach, which tend to be more generally applicable including to non-quantitative views, less fanatical, and, in my view, more fair),
the use of MEC with intertheoretic comparisons at all (possibly alongside other normalization approaches, rather than other normalization approaches for MEC without intertheoretic comparisons),
for almost each plausible grounding of a plausible PAV, the existence and use of a specific common scale for intertheoretic comparisons with some grounding of a total view (or similar) under MEC,
MEC with the given intertheoretic comparisons from 3 generally disapproving of family planning.
Your second consideration makes sense, and might result in a modest dampening effect on the 99% number, if the increase in mothersâ standard of living due to FEMâs intervention is highly weighed.
Ah, I meant to point this out because your quotes from MacAskill and Ord are critical of neutrality, and I donât expect neutrality to be very representative of those holding person-affecting views or who would otherwise support family planning for person-affecting reasons. It could be a strawman.
Your statements about PAV make sense. I typically think about PAV as you wrote:
A person-affecting view could ground value by using a total view-compatible welfare scale and then just restricting its use in a person-affecting way
But there could be other conceptions. Somewhat tangentially, Iâm deeply suspicious of views which donât allow comparison to other views, which I see as a handwave to avoid having to engage critically with alternative perspectives.
If Iâm talking to a person who doesnât care about animals, and I try to persuade them using moral uncertainty, and they say âno, but one human is worth infinity animals, so I can just ignore whatever magnitude of animal suffering you throw at meâ, and theyâre unwilling to actually quantify their scales and critically discuss what could change their mind, thatâs evidence that theyâre engaging in motivated reasoning.
As a result, I hold very low credence in views which donât admit some approach to intertheoretic comparison. I havenât spent much time thinking about which approach to resolving moral uncertainty is the best, but MEC has always seemed to me to be a clear default, as with maximizing EV in everyday decisionmaking. As with maximizing EV, MEC can also be fairly accused of fanaticism, which is a legitimate concern.
On neutrality, Iâve always considered the intuition of neutrality to be approximately lumpable with PAV, so please let me know if Iâm just wrong there. From what I recall, Chapter 8 of What we Owe the Future argues strenuously against both the intuition of neutrality and PAV, and when I was reading it, I didnât detect much of a difference between MacAskillâs treatment of the two.
I think there are legitimate possibilities for infinities and value lexicality, though (for me personally, extremely intense suffering seems like it could matter infinitely more), and MEC with intertheoretic comparisons would just mean infinity-chasing fanaticism.[1] It can be a race to the bottom to less plausible views, because you can have infinities that lexically dominate other infinities, with a lexicographic order. Youâre stuck with at least one of the following:
infinity-chasing fanaticism (with MEC with intertheoretic comparisons),
ruling out these views with certainty,
ruling out the intertheoretic comparisons,
not using MEC.
The full MEC argument in response to a view X on which humans matter infinitely more than nonhuman animals, allowing lexicographic orders, is not very intuitive. There are (at least) two possible groups of views to compare X to:
Y. Humans and nonhuman animals both matter only finitely.
Yâ. Humans and nonhuman animals both matter infinitely, an infinite âamplificationâ of Y.
(Also Z. Humans matter finitely, and some nonhuman animals matter infinitely.)
When you take expected values/âchoiceworthiness over X, Y and Yâ (and Z), you will get that Y is effectively ignored, and you end up with X and Yâ (and Z) deciding everything, and the interests of nonhuman animals wouldnât be lexically dominated. We can amplify X infinitely, too, and then do the same to Yâ, just shifting along the lexicographic order to higher infinities. And we can keep shifting lexicographically further and further. Then, the actual reason nonhuman animalsâ interests arenât lexically dominated, if theyâre not, will be because of exotic implausible views where nonhuman animals matter infinitely, to some high infinity. Even if itâs the right answer, that doesnât seem like the right way to get to it.
If you donât allow lexical amplifications, then you have to rule out one of Y or Yâ. Or maybe you only allow certain lexical amplifications.
I think the intuition of neutrality is sometimes just called âthe person-affecting restrictionâ, and any view satisfying it is a person-affecting view, but there are other person-affecting views (like asymmetric ones, wide ones). I consider it to be one among many person-affecting views.
Although you can also âamplifyâ any nonlexical view into a lexical one, by basically multiplying everything by infinity, e.g. shifting everything under a lexicographic order.
This is a good critique of MEC. Thanks for spelling it out, as Iâve never critically engaged with it before. At a high level, these arguments seem very similar to reductios of fanaticism in utilitarianism generally, such as the thought experiment of a 51% chance of double utility versus 49% chance of zero utility, and Pascalâs mugging.
I could play the game with the âhumans matter infinitely more than animalsâ person by saying âwell, in my philosophical theory, humans matter the same as in yours, but animals are on the same lexicographic position as humansâ. Of course, they could then say, âno, my lexicographic position of humanity is one degree greater than yoursâ, and so on.
This reminds me of Gödelâs Incompleteness Theorem, where you canât just fix your axiomatization of mathematics by adding the Gödel statement to the list of axioms, because then a new Gödel statement pops into existence. Even if you include an axiom schema where all of the Gödel statements get added to the list of axioms, a new kind of Gödel statement pops into existence. Thereâs no getting around the incompleteness result, because the incompleteness result comes from the power of the axiomatization of mathematics, not from some weakness which can be filled. Similarly, MEC can be said to be a âpowerfulâ system for reconciling moral uncertainty, because it can incorporate all moral views in some way, but that also allows views to be created which âexploitâ MEC in a way that other reconciliations arenât (as) susceptible to.
Thanks for these caveats! I largely agree, but they seem to only have a modest impact on the 99% claim.
Regarding intertheoretic comparison, my prior is that a person-affecting view (PAV) should have little to no effect on oneâs valuation of welfare. I donât really see why PAV vs non-PAV would radically disagree on how important it is to help others. In this case, the disagreement would indeed have to be radicalâeven if for some reason, PAV caused someone to 10x their valuation of welfare, theyâd still have to be 90% certain PAV was true for FEM to be positive.
For PAVs where value is grounded quite differently, I donât have an informed prior on just how different the PAVâs grounding of value may be. If there are highly supported PAVs where welfare is clearly valued far greater than non-PAV, then that would update the 99% claim. However, I donât know of any such PAV, nor of any non-PAV where welfare is valued far greater than PAV (which would have the opposite effect).
Your second consideration makes sense, and might result in a modest dampening effect on the 99% number, if the increase in mothersâ standard of living due to FEMâs intervention is highly weighed.
Couldnât agree more on the farmed and wild animal effects :) I wonât pretend to have any degree of certainty about how it all shakes out.
Itâs less about valuing individual welfare at a greater rate under PAVs (although that could happen in principle) and more about grounding value in ways that donât allow intertheoretic comparsions at all with total views, or just refusing to attempt such intertheortic comparisons altogether, or refusing to apply MEC using them. It could be like trying to compare temperature and weight, which seems absurd because they measure very different things. Even if the targets are at least superficially similar, like welfare in both cases, the units could still be incompatible, with no justifiable common scale or conversion rate between them.
A person-affecting view could ground value by using a total view-compatible welfare scale and then just restricting its use in a person-affecting way, and that would be a good candidate for a common scale with the total view and so intertheoretic comparsions under MEC in the obvious way: valuing welfare an existing individualâs welfare identically across the views. However, itâs not clear that this is the only plausible or preferred way to ground person-affecting views.
Stepping back, your argument depends on high confidence in multiple controversial assumptions:
the use of MEC at all (possibly alongside other approaches, rather than any other approaches to moral uncertainty not involving MEC, like a moral parliament or a property rights approach, which tend to be more generally applicable including to non-quantitative views, less fanatical, and, in my view, more fair),
the use of MEC with intertheoretic comparisons at all (possibly alongside other normalization approaches, rather than other normalization approaches for MEC without intertheoretic comparisons),
for almost each plausible grounding of a plausible PAV, the existence and use of a specific common scale for intertheoretic comparisons with some grounding of a total view (or similar) under MEC,
MEC with the given intertheoretic comparisons from 3 generally disapproving of family planning.
Ah, I meant to point this out because your quotes from MacAskill and Ord are critical of neutrality, and I donât expect neutrality to be very representative of those holding person-affecting views or who would otherwise support family planning for person-affecting reasons. It could be a strawman.
Your statements about PAV make sense. I typically think about PAV as you wrote:
But there could be other conceptions. Somewhat tangentially, Iâm deeply suspicious of views which donât allow comparison to other views, which I see as a handwave to avoid having to engage critically with alternative perspectives.
If Iâm talking to a person who doesnât care about animals, and I try to persuade them using moral uncertainty, and they say âno, but one human is worth infinity animals, so I can just ignore whatever magnitude of animal suffering you throw at meâ, and theyâre unwilling to actually quantify their scales and critically discuss what could change their mind, thatâs evidence that theyâre engaging in motivated reasoning.
As a result, I hold very low credence in views which donât admit some approach to intertheoretic comparison. I havenât spent much time thinking about which approach to resolving moral uncertainty is the best, but MEC has always seemed to me to be a clear default, as with maximizing EV in everyday decisionmaking. As with maximizing EV, MEC can also be fairly accused of fanaticism, which is a legitimate concern.
On neutrality, Iâve always considered the intuition of neutrality to be approximately lumpable with PAV, so please let me know if Iâm just wrong there. From what I recall, Chapter 8 of What we Owe the Future argues strenuously against both the intuition of neutrality and PAV, and when I was reading it, I didnât detect much of a difference between MacAskillâs treatment of the two.
I think there are legitimate possibilities for infinities and value lexicality, though (for me personally, extremely intense suffering seems like it could matter infinitely more), and MEC with intertheoretic comparisons would just mean infinity-chasing fanaticism.[1] It can be a race to the bottom to less plausible views, because you can have infinities that lexically dominate other infinities, with a lexicographic order. Youâre stuck with at least one of the following:
infinity-chasing fanaticism (with MEC with intertheoretic comparisons),
ruling out these views with certainty,
ruling out the intertheoretic comparisons,
not using MEC.
The full MEC argument in response to a view X on which humans matter infinitely more than nonhuman animals, allowing lexicographic orders, is not very intuitive. There are (at least) two possible groups of views to compare X to:
Y. Humans and nonhuman animals both matter only finitely.
Yâ. Humans and nonhuman animals both matter infinitely, an infinite âamplificationâ of Y.
(Also Z. Humans matter finitely, and some nonhuman animals matter infinitely.)
When you take expected values/âchoiceworthiness over X, Y and Yâ (and Z), you will get that Y is effectively ignored, and you end up with X and Yâ (and Z) deciding everything, and the interests of nonhuman animals wouldnât be lexically dominated. We can amplify X infinitely, too, and then do the same to Yâ, just shifting along the lexicographic order to higher infinities. And we can keep shifting lexicographically further and further. Then, the actual reason nonhuman animalsâ interests arenât lexically dominated, if theyâre not, will be because of exotic implausible views where nonhuman animals matter infinitely, to some high infinity. Even if itâs the right answer, that doesnât seem like the right way to get to it.
If you donât allow lexical amplifications, then you have to rule out one of Y or Yâ. Or maybe you only allow certain lexical amplifications.
For another critique of MECâs handling of infinities, see A dilemma for Maximize Expected Choiceworthiness (MEC), and the comments.
I think the intuition of neutrality is sometimes just called âthe person-affecting restrictionâ, and any view satisfying it is a person-affecting view, but there are other person-affecting views (like asymmetric ones, wide ones). I consider it to be one among many person-affecting views.
Although you can also âamplifyâ any nonlexical view into a lexical one, by basically multiplying everything by infinity, e.g. shifting everything under a lexicographic order.
This is a good critique of MEC. Thanks for spelling it out, as Iâve never critically engaged with it before. At a high level, these arguments seem very similar to reductios of fanaticism in utilitarianism generally, such as the thought experiment of a 51% chance of double utility versus 49% chance of zero utility, and Pascalâs mugging.
I could play the game with the âhumans matter infinitely more than animalsâ person by saying âwell, in my philosophical theory, humans matter the same as in yours, but animals are on the same lexicographic position as humansâ. Of course, they could then say, âno, my lexicographic position of humanity is one degree greater than yoursâ, and so on.
This reminds me of Gödelâs Incompleteness Theorem, where you canât just fix your axiomatization of mathematics by adding the Gödel statement to the list of axioms, because then a new Gödel statement pops into existence. Even if you include an axiom schema where all of the Gödel statements get added to the list of axioms, a new kind of Gödel statement pops into existence. Thereâs no getting around the incompleteness result, because the incompleteness result comes from the power of the axiomatization of mathematics, not from some weakness which can be filled. Similarly, MEC can be said to be a âpowerfulâ system for reconciling moral uncertainty, because it can incorporate all moral views in some way, but that also allows views to be created which âexploitâ MEC in a way that other reconciliations arenât (as) susceptible to.