Thanks for the contrarian take, though I still tentatively stand by my original stances. I should maybe mention 2 caveats here:
I also only read Reasons and Person ~4 years ago, and my memory can be quite faulty.
In particular I don’t remember many good arguments against naive consequentialism. To me, it really felt like parts 1 and 2 were mainly written as justification for axioms/”lemmas” invoked in parts 3 and 4, axioms that most EAs already buy.
My own context for reading the book was trying to start a Reasons and Persons book club right after he passed away. Our book club dissolved in the middle of reading section 2. I kept reading on, and I distinctively remember wishing that we continued onwards, because sections 3 and 4 would kept the other book clubbers engaged etc. (obviously this is very idiosyncratic and particular to our own club).
Thanks for the contrarian take, though I still tentatively stand by my original stances. I should maybe mention 2 caveats here:
I also only read Reasons and Person ~4 years ago, and my memory can be quite faulty.
In particular I don’t remember many good arguments against naive consequentialism. To me, it really felt like parts 1 and 2 were mainly written as justification for axioms/”lemmas” invoked in parts 3 and 4, axioms that most EAs already buy.
My own context for reading the book was trying to start a Reasons and Persons book club right after he passed away. Our book club dissolved in the middle of reading section 2. I kept reading on, and I distinctively remember wishing that we continued onwards, because sections 3 and 4 would kept the other book clubbers engaged etc. (obviously this is very idiosyncratic and particular to our own club).
If I had to pick two parts of it, it would be 3 and 4 but fwiw I got a bunch out of 1 and 2 over the last year for reasons similar to Max.