Executive summary: There is no principled way to balance the demands of morality against other values we hold, leaving us with an uneasy compromise in how we allocate our resources between them.
Key points:
Consequentialist morality can demand ever more from us, with no clear stopping point. Effective altruists feel this acutely.
The concept of a “moral saint” who pursues morality to the exclusion of other values illustrates the undesirability of taking morality to its logical conclusion.
A true utilitarian saint would want to rid themselves of competing non-moral values if possible, which seems to undermine the authenticity of those values.
There are important non-moral values, like love and beauty, that we perceive as intrinsically valuable, not just instrumentally useful for morality.
The author sees no principled solution for how to balance moral and non-moral values, leaving only an uneasy, unprincipled compromise.
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, andcontact us if you have feedback.
Executive summary: There is no principled way to balance the demands of morality against other values we hold, leaving us with an uneasy compromise in how we allocate our resources between them.
Key points:
Consequentialist morality can demand ever more from us, with no clear stopping point. Effective altruists feel this acutely.
The concept of a “moral saint” who pursues morality to the exclusion of other values illustrates the undesirability of taking morality to its logical conclusion.
A true utilitarian saint would want to rid themselves of competing non-moral values if possible, which seems to undermine the authenticity of those values.
There are important non-moral values, like love and beauty, that we perceive as intrinsically valuable, not just instrumentally useful for morality.
The author sees no principled solution for how to balance moral and non-moral values, leaving only an uneasy, unprincipled compromise.
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, and contact us if you have feedback.
Thanks SummaryBot! Looks good to me :)