Very proud to have kickstarted the animal rights movement that started before I was born because they were all motivated to slightly boost my substack engagement numbers!
Kind of nobody likes thinking about animal stuff because your choices are
1. Keep doing something that is probably morally wrong, knowing that millions of animals are being tortured, or
2. Stop doing (or continue not doing) some of the morally wrong things, at some real cost (in pleasure at least) to yourself, knowing that millions of animals are still being tortured anyway.
I do, however, like these posts, because I am a sicko who likes to be morally exhorted. And it's important. So thank you!
I'm reminded of that heat map that was going the rounds of twitter recently. A lot of people with a very narrow moral circle just could not give up the idea that if you care about one more distant or less significant group, you're not just wasting your own time and energy. You must be somehow TAKING from people in the closer or more significant group. You have to be. It's literally impossible that when you care about more beings, you are a more moral and caring person. No, somebody's GOT to be getting the shaft somewhere. You're one of those people in Dickens who donates to causes across the world while neglecting your own children, because it's impossible to do both.
And I puzzled a while over why that is—scarcity mindset, for instance, or having dealt with those Dickens-philanthropist types. But maybe it really is what you suggest: because it justifies their own lack of care. They don't want to say "I care about x beings, and you care about x+y, so therefore you're doing a lot of extra caring and are more moral than me in some way." So it's gotta be, "caring about y necessitates actively murdering x somehow," whether the evidence exists to support that claim or not.
Animal rights aren't something I spend a lot of my moral energy on, I will admit, but I do care *some.* I think if I were a better person I would care more and do more about it. And I feel it's better morally to go "hey, I am not the world's most ethical person, people who care more than me are more ethical," than to insist that anyone doing more is lying.
Though I suppose it goes hand with the idea that there is no "more moral" or "less moral," there are saints and sinners and we are all obliged to be saints. Deontology doesn't really leave room for the idea that a thing can be morally praiseworthy but you're not a monster for not doing it.
I think Islam actually has a 5-category system. I searched a little and this is what I found:
There are 5 categories of actions in Islam and they are as follows:
Obligatory (Wajib, Fard ), is that which the Lawgiver (Allah) has enjoined by way of it being compulsory.
Examples of obligatory actions include the five daily prayers, fasting Ramadan, Zakah for those who are obliged to give it, and Hajj to the Sacred House for those who have the means of doing so.
The one who does it will be rewarded for obeying the command, and the one who does not do it deserves to be punished.
Encouraged or recommended (Mustahab, Sunnah, Masnun or Nafl ), is that which is prescribed by the Lawgiver, but not by way of it being obligatory or compulsory.
Examples of recommended actions include Qiyam Al-layl, the regular Sunnah prayers that are additional to the five obligatory prayers, fasting three days of every month, fasting six days of Shawwal, giving charity to the poor, and regularly reciting Adhkar and Quran.
The one who does it will be rewarded for complying, but the one who does not do it will not be punished.
Prohibited or forbidden (Haram), is that which the Lawgiver prohibits in the sense that it is obligatory to refrain from doing it.
Examples of forbidden actions include fornication or adultery, Riba (usury), drinking alcohol, disobedience to parents, shaving off the beard, and women displaying their adornment in front of men (who are not allowed to see her without Hijab).
The one who refrains from doing that which is prohibited will be rewarded for complying, and the one who does it deserves to be punished.
Disliked (Makruh), is that which the Lawgiver disallowed, but not in the sense of it being obligatory to refrain from it.
Examples of disliked actions include giving and taking with the left hand; women following funeral processions; socialising after the `Isha’ prayer; praying in a garment of which no part is covers the shoulder; offering supererogatory prayers after Fajr until the sun is fully risen, or after `Asr until the sun has set.
The person who refrains from a disliked action will be rewarded for complying, but the one who does it will not be punished.
Permissible (Mubah, Halal, Ja’iz), is that to which no command or prohibition is connected to the deed itself.
Examples of permissible actions include eating and drinking; buying and selling; travelling for the purpose of tourism or seeking provision; engaging in intimacy with spouses during the night in Ramadan.
The restriction on the definition of what is permissible is indicated by the phrase “To the deed itself”, because there may be an instruction that is connected to it, which makes it enjoined or disallowed.
In principle, buying water is permissible, but if doing Wudu for an obligatory prayer depends on that, then it becomes obligatory to buy it, because anything without which an obligatory duty cannot be completed becomes obligatory.
In principle, travelling for the purpose of tourism or leisure is permissible, but if that travel is to a land of the disbelievers in which there is a great deal of temptation and evildoing, and immorality is widespread, then that travelling becomes prohibited, because it is a means that leads one to falling into that which is unlawful.
For more details, please see the following answers: 174947 , 26242 , 14258 , and 36546
For more information, please see the following books:
Rawdat An-Nazir wa Jannat Al-Manazir by Ibn Qudamah (1/150-210)
Al-Bahr Al-Muhit by Az-Zarkashi (1/140-240)
Sharh Al-Usul min ‘Ilm Al-Usool by Ibn ‘Uthaymin (p. 46-68)
There's no getting away from the implication that a person with a more expansive circle of moral concern has in some sense a "bigger heart" than someone with a smaller one.
When comparing moral virtue it seems like people default to a comparative frame, "better/worse" - which inevitably triggers status sensitivity, rather than a threshold or sufficiency frame, such as "enough/too much".
A minimum threshold, if calibrated to be attainable by most people, is less likely to make everyone defensive because you either meet it or you don't, so the assigning of social credit is more egalitarian. You aren't constantly having to rank people's virtue points relative to others, which will always be contentious as long as perceived virtue is a social currency.
Was the “if you really believed this, you’d take some extreme and totally impractical action about it” fallacy only invented recently? I feel like I’ve only seen it in the past few years (see also “if people were really concerned about AI risk they’d be committing terrorist strikes against AI data centers”). I think the exercise of, “is there anything you strongly believe that you don’t think should be accomplished through extreme and impractical actions?” is a good one.
This type of logic opened the door to me being an atheist despite being raised as a liberal Christian (Episcopal). If Hell existed, why wasn’t my family constantly proselytizing? I think my church dropped the ball here, because I could have been taught what they actually believed about Hell, rather than just having the popular conception. But it was probably futile to retain me anyway.
For real - I see this argument increasingly and it seems like it's aiming for some kind of reductio and absurdum but it always ends in really terribly supported chains of logic.
Like, apparently I can't really believe anything whatsoever if I am not motivated to:
It’s also a weird sidestepping of the merits of the argument! From the perspective of truth, what does it matter if I believe my own argument? Even if someone could prove, beyond doubt, that I didn’t believe it, the merits of the argument would still be the merits. If I’m making an argument I don’t believe, that’s a reason to not debate with me, not to dismiss the argument itself.
Has there ever been a good argument of the form "If people who say X *really* believed it, they'd say/do Y, and they don't so they're conning you, so X isn't true" where Y is some really quite socially unacceptable thing like advocating forced sterilization or killing people?
It doesn't seem like it should be impossible for there to be such an argument out there, because there's nothing in this construction that means it *has* to be a bad argument. There *could* be Xs that so universally, so strongly imply Y that, even given Y's (by construction) social costs or extreme nature, a lack of Y makes the X-claimers likely to be liars or something like that, and then there are some situations where [the people claiming X is true being liars] is actively strong evidence against X.
But I can't think of any examples where, given specifics, it actually delivers any force, not that I've seen in the wild, or even that I can think of given a few minutes.
There's one right in the article about the other guy who believes most people literally go to hell, and at the same time advocates for more people to be born. I'm sure someone could figure out counter-arguments to that, but on a quick look it's a real punch.
So, fair point. But, I can't say exactly why, but this one didn't feel convincing either. And I didn't really try to hard to work out if it really should be, because it's not directed against me or a position I find compelling, but also because it was pretty clearly presented as a sort of "Hey, see how I can make this kind of argument too? Seems dumb, hey?" then as a 'real' argument, so I didn't evaluate it too closely. In general, I don't think the arguments nested in that r rhetorical form are *meant* to have independent force, that's not really the point, but maybe it does in this case nonetheless!
Not really. It does not argue Christians should avocate for, say, mass stérilisation, but that their beliefs logically imply another belief (anti-natalism).
If you're crude enough about it, it does. Combine it with basic utilitarianism, and compare: a fertile woman is a walking nonzero probability of begatting a heathen who will go to hell and enjoy infinite disutility, whereas sterilizing the lady is only a finite evil. Clearly worth it in the balance!
Yes, a Christian can criticize those who claim to follow the math for not following the math hard enough, while being exempt from having that criticism turned back on them because the Christian doesn't claim to follow the math in the first place.
something I found compelling is "if you believe that women should be forced to carry babies to term against their will, you ought to also believe that people should be forced to be organ donors where it would save the life of another"; this isn't a great example because I was already pro-choice and "compelling" here means "I became more confused about how pro-life people could consistently hold their position", rather than actually changing my mind about the issue
Now this is getting closer. I think in the case of rape specifically it works, and I think I remember finding it convincing when I myself was pro life and unsure and uncomfortable about rape exceptions. I think in other routes up pregnancy it doesn't hold because one doesn't have much control over what organs one happens to have.
Example: If pro-lifers believed that fetuses were people, they wouldn’t support rape exceptions. My sister tells me that this logic led courts to strike some abortion restrictions (pre-Dobbs, maybe pre-Casey). I cannot find a citation for this
I am one of the pro-lifers who is against rape exceptions.
I think it's often seen as A. as a sort of excessionary mercy, similar to how many people would be unwilling to convict someone who murdered their domestic abuser in cold blood even if it was totally criminal, B. negotiation/compromise to get a legal restriction on most abortions established (I would probably take that compromise), or C. based on deontology where the justification for restriction abortion is unsound if the pregnancy is entirely the result of a criminal act by a third party.
My proposed legal restrictions in a secular country are very different from my sense of ethics. (my proposed legal restrictions as an absolute monarch aren't even the same as my sense of ethics!)
Not a bad shout but I don't think it's likely to be true. I knew a lot of pro-lifers back in my Christian days, and would be willing to bet at very unfavourable odds that they honestly believed fetuses were people, and most supported rape exceptions. I think the reason it logically doesn't work out is that it requires another strong conviction, that killing a person is always wrong, for the three together to form a contradiction. But I think most of them, like most Christians and most people, didn't have that third leg of what would otherwise be an inconsistent triad.
I think that sometimes believing X implies saying/doing both Y and Z, and people's attitude about Y and Z seem wildly out of step with each other.
(the classic one being where Y is self-aggrandizing in some way, or implies power over other people, and Z is not).
A few not-EA-ish examples:
- Prepper-gun-survivalist types who practice shooting and tactics but won't exercise or do logistics.
- Radical Christians who combine all kinds of political beliefs and personal self-denials that are weird and unpopular in mainstream society, with a shockingly high level of participation in mainstream society even when unforced.
- Many people's view of environmentalists and the "Green New Deal".
Usually I think that the belief in X is more imperfect/corrupted than actually merely false.
If anything that's the reverse argument? You're criticizing them for taking extreme (but high-signaling) actions ostensibly from their beliefs and not comparatively mundane ones that are reasonably as or more (generally more) effective.
Not intending to make that argument (withdrawing from mainstream society is not exactly mundane, and the Green New Deal commentary is more about a *lack* of extreme or high-signaling actions.)
I think most of this is about people thinking through their actions largely on habit, not anything dishonest even to themselves.
It a popular argument precisely because it assumes most moral exhortations are a status tool and not a serious logical proposition, so it thinks by exposing this by showing an apparent inconsistency between beliefs and implied action, it disempowers the tool's usefulness for social leverage.
This is not a bad assumption actually - it only fails when people are actually making a serious logical proposition and not just playing games, but that's the exception, not the rule.
> But I have met so many people who are in that place—who dunk on vegans and reskeet “PETA kills animals!” because on some level they know that what we do to animals on farms is wrong. And if you are in that place, and by some chance you’re reading this: to help farmed animals, you don’t have to quit your job, throw out all your leather boots, turn down Grandma’s turkey at Christmas, and start living exclusively on lentils. Every little bit matters: voting for pro-animal ballot propositions, writing retailers to ask them to make cage-free pledges, sharing videos on Facebook, having conversations with your equally omnivorous friends, or (yes) donating to help buy stunners for shrimp. Please listen to the part of you that knows that animal cruelty is wrong.
On my worse days, this feels false. Making ‘reasonable compromises’ seems like it’s never going to make (even EA sphere!) animal advocates stop arguing that you’re evil and guilt-tripping you. Given this, if you want to not feel bad about animals, ameliatarianism or donations or such seem doomed. Working to not ignore your tendency to care about animals seems like a slippery slope to ruining your entire life over it.
(I write this as someone who is currently not buying fish sauce due to welfare concerns, even though there aren’t Thai or Chinese style soy or oyster sauces of decent quality for sale without gluten. (If your first ingredient is artificial color, your soy sauce is bad.) I have also given up nuggets instead of replacing plant protein nuggets with GF chicken nuggets. If you don’t want to risk making these kinds of sacrifices, you need to not care about animals.)
Yeaaaaaaah I think a lot of people go vegan because it's easy for them and then assume that going vegan is equally easy for everyone else, so failing to do so means you're a bad person and a hypocrite. I am trying my best to push against this! But unfortunately I have no ability to keep people from doing things I disapprove of.
Maybe vegans should focus more on making pre-seasoned tofu cheaper than eggs per unit protein, instead of high-end luxury Just Egg. <del>And on making hypoallergenic fish sauce substitutes. And making hypoallergenic mock chicken broth concentrate that tastes half as good as Better than Bouillon No Chicken soup base. Or at least just some yeast extract.</del>
Very black-pilling. I no longer think there is an easy end-run around the hard problem of cultural change. It is important for some vegans to focus on the latter, possibly the majority.
The concept of PTC-competitive fake meat that resembles a meat other than sausage, hamburger, or similar non-ground / non-minced meat is not even considered.
It's one study that covers a situation that we can empirically test specifically pushing back against a hypothesis that is taken for granted. I don't think this is a real flaw in the study.
After all, if the hypothesis is not true for hamburgers, it is not always true. You only need one counterexample.
Chasing group approval is a losing proposition, you don't want to get caught in purity contests. It's a matter of picking a decent "schelling point" and calling it a day. If you go something like 90% flexitarian with a preference for non-factory for the remaining animal products, you won't win any purity prizes, but you're already so far off the distribution that your contribution to the problem basically doesn't matter.
I think you should (strive to) feel good or bad based more on the real consequences of your actions than whether somebody criticizes you. Somebody will always criticize you from one direction or the other for basically anything these days.
I'm not vegan; a while back I was compelled to stop eating pork after I read an essay that argued it was particularly awful to particularly smart creatures. Probably I should still feel guilty that I occasionally eat chicken and fish, but presumably I should feel LESS guilty than I did before.
"Making ‘reasonable compromises’ seems like it’s never going to make (even EA sphere!) animal advocates stop arguing that you’re evil and guilt-tripping you."
and this is why doing things to make other people stop arguing you are evil is bad decision-making algorithm. what is weird is that people that is the algorithm they follow, tend to project it all over the place. so they hear calling to listen to their own inner voice - the direct opposite of listening to other people - and to find what they, themselves, consider moral, and somehow convert it to... this.
there is alternative, that include internal moral compass, but i just don't know who to communicate that to people who read "listen to the part of you" and react with "it’s never going to make (even EA sphere!) animal advocates stop arguing that you’re evil and guilt-tripping you.".
and it's look like if people like me will write about their inner experience it will be bad for people like you, despite that fact i have zero guilt about my decisions. and i want to suggest the skill of noticing you own interpretation and the difference between it and what actually written, but i think it's the emotional problem that is in the core, and i really don't know what make some people able to say "it's right because i say so, and i am the fountainhead of all morality", wile other can't.
but... maybe start with noticing that listening to yourself and listening to guilt-tripping assholes, real and imaginary, is the direct opposite, on the axis if internal-external?
also, it' very much possible BOTH avoiding that type of sacrificed and care about animals. i'm doing that, other people do. some people have skill issues and can't, but it's fact about their limitations, not the universal impossibility of it.
Kikkoman tamari is fine for Japanese foods. But a Chinese style soy sauce has this perfect Chinese-takeout flavor which Kikkoman doesn’t. I haven’t seen a Chinese style tamari yet.
Addendum: Seriously, if you're not allergic to regular soy sauce and you like Chinese food, you should try some of the stuff marketed as "light superior soy sauce" or such on your rice or stir fries at home. See https://thewoksoflife.com/soy-sauce/ for more information.
Fair enough, you like your Chinese to stay properly Chinese. De gustibus... :) I'm not picky myself, happy to mix and match tasty ingredients from all over, from gochujang to podi powder to sambal olek to shoyu or tamari.
A bit of a comment on the Christian natalism thing:
Besides the fact that:
1. most Christians are not utilitarians / consequentialists,
2. Pretty much any proposed "noble sin" in Christianity comes with an obligation for you to not do it (on pain of eternal Hellfire) and for other people to stop you
3. In general, it is considered an obligation for there to continue to be a future Church
I think that this kind of statistical approach to people being expected to suffer Hellfire will tend to smack of Calvinism and excessive pessimism about salvation to people who aren't Calvinists -- even people who very much believe that a significant number of people potentially go to Hell.
What do you think of the argument that "weird" causes like shrimp welfare turn people against EA as a whole. Of course, you can be an EA and give exclusively to Givewell's Global Development Fund or something, but you'll still be associated with weird shrimp people. At some level of weirdness, people who would otherwise give to AMF do not because their perception of EA-ness has been sullied. It's not unheard of: some people absolutely refuse to be vegan because of PETA's antics and weird vegans online.
I have tried to talk to some of my friends about EA but they are turned off by what they perceive to be "AI God" theories. These people are givers. They already give to non-EA charities but don't want to be associated with the weirdos.
Has this kind of survey been done? It could be done among the general population and among people who regularly give to non-EA charities. How many of them would give to EA charities if it wasn't so heavily association with "weird" causes? How many human lives are being left at the table? How many shrimp are worth a single malaria death?
so here is my honest option - if i need to chose between people who refuse to save the life of kids because they found the association of AI off-putting, and people who aim to do the most good, even when it's low status and weird, it's blindingly obvious who i want to have in my movement. and less then 10% of my donations go to AI-related causes.
i will lose a lot of respect to any person who actually say that they will not send money to save children from malaria because there are weird nerds there, and it's so low status. like, how this is not supervillain level bad?
that is obviously evil, and it is obviously bad for any movement that aim for doing good to court that sort of people. that attitude is morally corrosive. the fact that EA actively repel those people is good, and if it stop it will become yet another generic sad-puppies-diaereses movement with time.
the ability of EA do what is right even if it's weird is in the core of it. give that away, and with time you will lose everything.
Yep, this is my take. The thing that EA is-- which is good and precious-- is that we report honestly what we think the best charities are without attention to PR considerations. If you want to shade the truth in order to get people to do things that seem net-positive, there's a great place to do that, which is the rest of the charity world.
Well, for instance, GiveWell doesn't put any money towards AI or shrimp, right? I don't think it calls itself an "EA charity." Maybe rather than arguing the merits of EA, just try to convince your friends that these particular charities do the most good most efficiently?
I gave to GiveWell as an extremely not-EA-aligned person who thinks that Givewell-style optimization is worth doing, but I'm also a somewhat unsocial weirdo even within my particular decidedly dissident political sphere.
Givewell never seemed connected to "AI god" talk from my perspective but I may just be inured to "AI god" talk.
Why "It feels morally unconscionable to let children die to save animals—as it should be." instead of, say, "It feels morally unconscionable to save the life of someone who will almost certainly personally fund the torture of many many beings who also deserve happiness—as it should be.."
B’s Bulldog gets higher engagement when he writes about animal well fare is because otherwise he writes about the Fine Tuning argument for God’s existence, which just pisses most of his audience off
Very proud to have kickstarted the animal rights movement that started before I was born because they were all motivated to slightly boost my substack engagement numbers!
Kind of nobody likes thinking about animal stuff because your choices are
1. Keep doing something that is probably morally wrong, knowing that millions of animals are being tortured, or
2. Stop doing (or continue not doing) some of the morally wrong things, at some real cost (in pleasure at least) to yourself, knowing that millions of animals are still being tortured anyway.
I do, however, like these posts, because I am a sicko who likes to be morally exhorted. And it's important. So thank you!
I'm reminded of that heat map that was going the rounds of twitter recently. A lot of people with a very narrow moral circle just could not give up the idea that if you care about one more distant or less significant group, you're not just wasting your own time and energy. You must be somehow TAKING from people in the closer or more significant group. You have to be. It's literally impossible that when you care about more beings, you are a more moral and caring person. No, somebody's GOT to be getting the shaft somewhere. You're one of those people in Dickens who donates to causes across the world while neglecting your own children, because it's impossible to do both.
And I puzzled a while over why that is—scarcity mindset, for instance, or having dealt with those Dickens-philanthropist types. But maybe it really is what you suggest: because it justifies their own lack of care. They don't want to say "I care about x beings, and you care about x+y, so therefore you're doing a lot of extra caring and are more moral than me in some way." So it's gotta be, "caring about y necessitates actively murdering x somehow," whether the evidence exists to support that claim or not.
Animal rights aren't something I spend a lot of my moral energy on, I will admit, but I do care *some.* I think if I were a better person I would care more and do more about it. And I feel it's better morally to go "hey, I am not the world's most ethical person, people who care more than me are more ethical," than to insist that anyone doing more is lying.
Though I suppose it goes hand with the idea that there is no "more moral" or "less moral," there are saints and sinners and we are all obliged to be saints. Deontology doesn't really leave room for the idea that a thing can be morally praiseworthy but you're not a monster for not doing it.
You might be right.
I think Islam actually has a 5-category system. I searched a little and this is what I found:
There are 5 categories of actions in Islam and they are as follows:
Obligatory (Wajib, Fard ), is that which the Lawgiver (Allah) has enjoined by way of it being compulsory.
Examples of obligatory actions include the five daily prayers, fasting Ramadan, Zakah for those who are obliged to give it, and Hajj to the Sacred House for those who have the means of doing so.
The one who does it will be rewarded for obeying the command, and the one who does not do it deserves to be punished.
Encouraged or recommended (Mustahab, Sunnah, Masnun or Nafl ), is that which is prescribed by the Lawgiver, but not by way of it being obligatory or compulsory.
Examples of recommended actions include Qiyam Al-layl, the regular Sunnah prayers that are additional to the five obligatory prayers, fasting three days of every month, fasting six days of Shawwal, giving charity to the poor, and regularly reciting Adhkar and Quran.
The one who does it will be rewarded for complying, but the one who does not do it will not be punished.
Prohibited or forbidden (Haram), is that which the Lawgiver prohibits in the sense that it is obligatory to refrain from doing it.
Examples of forbidden actions include fornication or adultery, Riba (usury), drinking alcohol, disobedience to parents, shaving off the beard, and women displaying their adornment in front of men (who are not allowed to see her without Hijab).
The one who refrains from doing that which is prohibited will be rewarded for complying, and the one who does it deserves to be punished.
Disliked (Makruh), is that which the Lawgiver disallowed, but not in the sense of it being obligatory to refrain from it.
Examples of disliked actions include giving and taking with the left hand; women following funeral processions; socialising after the `Isha’ prayer; praying in a garment of which no part is covers the shoulder; offering supererogatory prayers after Fajr until the sun is fully risen, or after `Asr until the sun has set.
The person who refrains from a disliked action will be rewarded for complying, but the one who does it will not be punished.
Permissible (Mubah, Halal, Ja’iz), is that to which no command or prohibition is connected to the deed itself.
Examples of permissible actions include eating and drinking; buying and selling; travelling for the purpose of tourism or seeking provision; engaging in intimacy with spouses during the night in Ramadan.
The restriction on the definition of what is permissible is indicated by the phrase “To the deed itself”, because there may be an instruction that is connected to it, which makes it enjoined or disallowed.
In principle, buying water is permissible, but if doing Wudu for an obligatory prayer depends on that, then it becomes obligatory to buy it, because anything without which an obligatory duty cannot be completed becomes obligatory.
In principle, travelling for the purpose of tourism or leisure is permissible, but if that travel is to a land of the disbelievers in which there is a great deal of temptation and evildoing, and immorality is widespread, then that travelling becomes prohibited, because it is a means that leads one to falling into that which is unlawful.
For more details, please see the following answers: 174947 , 26242 , 14258 , and 36546
For more information, please see the following books:
Rawdat An-Nazir wa Jannat Al-Manazir by Ibn Qudamah (1/150-210)
Al-Bahr Al-Muhit by Az-Zarkashi (1/140-240)
Sharh Al-Usul min ‘Ilm Al-Usool by Ibn ‘Uthaymin (p. 46-68)
https://islamqa.info/en/answers/180341/categories-of-actions-in-islam
There's no getting away from the implication that a person with a more expansive circle of moral concern has in some sense a "bigger heart" than someone with a smaller one.
When comparing moral virtue it seems like people default to a comparative frame, "better/worse" - which inevitably triggers status sensitivity, rather than a threshold or sufficiency frame, such as "enough/too much".
A minimum threshold, if calibrated to be attainable by most people, is less likely to make everyone defensive because you either meet it or you don't, so the assigning of social credit is more egalitarian. You aren't constantly having to rank people's virtue points relative to others, which will always be contentious as long as perceived virtue is a social currency.
I think you're right.
I've just kind of accepted I'm not a great person and just try not to be awful.
Was the “if you really believed this, you’d take some extreme and totally impractical action about it” fallacy only invented recently? I feel like I’ve only seen it in the past few years (see also “if people were really concerned about AI risk they’d be committing terrorist strikes against AI data centers”). I think the exercise of, “is there anything you strongly believe that you don’t think should be accomplished through extreme and impractical actions?” is a good one.
This type of logic opened the door to me being an atheist despite being raised as a liberal Christian (Episcopal). If Hell existed, why wasn’t my family constantly proselytizing? I think my church dropped the ball here, because I could have been taught what they actually believed about Hell, rather than just having the popular conception. But it was probably futile to retain me anyway.
I do miss church though. I love the music.
Sorry this is very off-topic from the OP
For real - I see this argument increasingly and it seems like it's aiming for some kind of reductio and absurdum but it always ends in really terribly supported chains of logic.
Like, apparently I can't really believe anything whatsoever if I am not motivated to:
- Invest thousands of dollars based on it
- Murder people
- Literally flee the country
(All of these are real examples.)
It’s also a weird sidestepping of the merits of the argument! From the perspective of truth, what does it matter if I believe my own argument? Even if someone could prove, beyond doubt, that I didn’t believe it, the merits of the argument would still be the merits. If I’m making an argument I don’t believe, that’s a reason to not debate with me, not to dismiss the argument itself.
https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/06/13/arguments-from-my-opponent-believes-something/
There it is, #9!
Andres from SWP here…
“But at least he’s raking in all that sweet, sweet shrimp stunner manufacturer money.” 😂😂🤣😂🤣
Has there ever been a good argument of the form "If people who say X *really* believed it, they'd say/do Y, and they don't so they're conning you, so X isn't true" where Y is some really quite socially unacceptable thing like advocating forced sterilization or killing people?
It doesn't seem like it should be impossible for there to be such an argument out there, because there's nothing in this construction that means it *has* to be a bad argument. There *could* be Xs that so universally, so strongly imply Y that, even given Y's (by construction) social costs or extreme nature, a lack of Y makes the X-claimers likely to be liars or something like that, and then there are some situations where [the people claiming X is true being liars] is actively strong evidence against X.
But I can't think of any examples where, given specifics, it actually delivers any force, not that I've seen in the wild, or even that I can think of given a few minutes.
There's one right in the article about the other guy who believes most people literally go to hell, and at the same time advocates for more people to be born. I'm sure someone could figure out counter-arguments to that, but on a quick look it's a real punch.
So, fair point. But, I can't say exactly why, but this one didn't feel convincing either. And I didn't really try to hard to work out if it really should be, because it's not directed against me or a position I find compelling, but also because it was pretty clearly presented as a sort of "Hey, see how I can make this kind of argument too? Seems dumb, hey?" then as a 'real' argument, so I didn't evaluate it too closely. In general, I don't think the arguments nested in that r rhetorical form are *meant* to have independent force, that's not really the point, but maybe it does in this case nonetheless!
Not really. It does not argue Christians should avocate for, say, mass stérilisation, but that their beliefs logically imply another belief (anti-natalism).
If you're crude enough about it, it does. Combine it with basic utilitarianism, and compare: a fertile woman is a walking nonzero probability of begatting a heathen who will go to hell and enjoy infinite disutility, whereas sterilizing the lady is only a finite evil. Clearly worth it in the balance!
Conservative Christians are very emphatically not basic utilitarians.
Yes, a Christian can criticize those who claim to follow the math for not following the math hard enough, while being exempt from having that criticism turned back on them because the Christian doesn't claim to follow the math in the first place.
This is nothing specific to Christians let's be clear https://thingofthings.substack.com/p/effective-altruism-taking-ideas-seriously
You're right. It's still funny to imagine they could be, like a mash-up of two clashing musical styles :)
something I found compelling is "if you believe that women should be forced to carry babies to term against their will, you ought to also believe that people should be forced to be organ donors where it would save the life of another"; this isn't a great example because I was already pro-choice and "compelling" here means "I became more confused about how pro-life people could consistently hold their position", rather than actually changing my mind about the issue
Now this is getting closer. I think in the case of rape specifically it works, and I think I remember finding it convincing when I myself was pro life and unsure and uncomfortable about rape exceptions. I think in other routes up pregnancy it doesn't hold because one doesn't have much control over what organs one happens to have.
Example: If pro-lifers believed that fetuses were people, they wouldn’t support rape exceptions. My sister tells me that this logic led courts to strike some abortion restrictions (pre-Dobbs, maybe pre-Casey). I cannot find a citation for this
I am one of the pro-lifers who is against rape exceptions.
I think it's often seen as A. as a sort of excessionary mercy, similar to how many people would be unwilling to convict someone who murdered their domestic abuser in cold blood even if it was totally criminal, B. negotiation/compromise to get a legal restriction on most abortions established (I would probably take that compromise), or C. based on deontology where the justification for restriction abortion is unsound if the pregnancy is entirely the result of a criminal act by a third party.
My proposed legal restrictions in a secular country are very different from my sense of ethics. (my proposed legal restrictions as an absolute monarch aren't even the same as my sense of ethics!)
Not a bad shout but I don't think it's likely to be true. I knew a lot of pro-lifers back in my Christian days, and would be willing to bet at very unfavourable odds that they honestly believed fetuses were people, and most supported rape exceptions. I think the reason it logically doesn't work out is that it requires another strong conviction, that killing a person is always wrong, for the three together to form a contradiction. But I think most of them, like most Christians and most people, didn't have that third leg of what would otherwise be an inconsistent triad.
I think that sometimes believing X implies saying/doing both Y and Z, and people's attitude about Y and Z seem wildly out of step with each other.
(the classic one being where Y is self-aggrandizing in some way, or implies power over other people, and Z is not).
A few not-EA-ish examples:
- Prepper-gun-survivalist types who practice shooting and tactics but won't exercise or do logistics.
- Radical Christians who combine all kinds of political beliefs and personal self-denials that are weird and unpopular in mainstream society, with a shockingly high level of participation in mainstream society even when unforced.
- Many people's view of environmentalists and the "Green New Deal".
Usually I think that the belief in X is more imperfect/corrupted than actually merely false.
If anything that's the reverse argument? You're criticizing them for taking extreme (but high-signaling) actions ostensibly from their beliefs and not comparatively mundane ones that are reasonably as or more (generally more) effective.
Not intending to make that argument (withdrawing from mainstream society is not exactly mundane, and the Green New Deal commentary is more about a *lack* of extreme or high-signaling actions.)
I think most of this is about people thinking through their actions largely on habit, not anything dishonest even to themselves.
It a popular argument precisely because it assumes most moral exhortations are a status tool and not a serious logical proposition, so it thinks by exposing this by showing an apparent inconsistency between beliefs and implied action, it disempowers the tool's usefulness for social leverage.
This is not a bad assumption actually - it only fails when people are actually making a serious logical proposition and not just playing games, but that's the exception, not the rule.
> But I have met so many people who are in that place—who dunk on vegans and reskeet “PETA kills animals!” because on some level they know that what we do to animals on farms is wrong. And if you are in that place, and by some chance you’re reading this: to help farmed animals, you don’t have to quit your job, throw out all your leather boots, turn down Grandma’s turkey at Christmas, and start living exclusively on lentils. Every little bit matters: voting for pro-animal ballot propositions, writing retailers to ask them to make cage-free pledges, sharing videos on Facebook, having conversations with your equally omnivorous friends, or (yes) donating to help buy stunners for shrimp. Please listen to the part of you that knows that animal cruelty is wrong.
On my worse days, this feels false. Making ‘reasonable compromises’ seems like it’s never going to make (even EA sphere!) animal advocates stop arguing that you’re evil and guilt-tripping you. Given this, if you want to not feel bad about animals, ameliatarianism or donations or such seem doomed. Working to not ignore your tendency to care about animals seems like a slippery slope to ruining your entire life over it.
(I write this as someone who is currently not buying fish sauce due to welfare concerns, even though there aren’t Thai or Chinese style soy or oyster sauces of decent quality for sale without gluten. (If your first ingredient is artificial color, your soy sauce is bad.) I have also given up nuggets instead of replacing plant protein nuggets with GF chicken nuggets. If you don’t want to risk making these kinds of sacrifices, you need to not care about animals.)
Yeaaaaaaah I think a lot of people go vegan because it's easy for them and then assume that going vegan is equally easy for everyone else, so failing to do so means you're a bad person and a hypocrite. I am trying my best to push against this! But unfortunately I have no ability to keep people from doing things I disapprove of.
Maybe vegans should focus more on making pre-seasoned tofu cheaper than eggs per unit protein, instead of high-end luxury Just Egg. <del>And on making hypoallergenic fish sauce substitutes. And making hypoallergenic mock chicken broth concentrate that tastes half as good as Better than Bouillon No Chicken soup base. Or at least just some yeast extract.</del>
Unfortunately, while this seems like an appealing solution, it does not seem likely to work without cultural change given the data we have on substitution with PTC-competitive plant based meats: https://rethinkpriorities.org/research-area/price-taste-and-convenience-competitive-plant-based-meat-would-not-currently-replace-meat/
Very black-pilling. I no longer think there is an easy end-run around the hard problem of cultural change. It is important for some vegans to focus on the latter, possibly the majority.
Massive elephant in the room of that article:
The concept of PTC-competitive fake meat that resembles a meat other than sausage, hamburger, or similar non-ground / non-minced meat is not even considered.
It's one study that covers a situation that we can empirically test specifically pushing back against a hypothesis that is taken for granted. I don't think this is a real flaw in the study.
After all, if the hypothesis is not true for hamburgers, it is not always true. You only need one counterexample.
Chasing group approval is a losing proposition, you don't want to get caught in purity contests. It's a matter of picking a decent "schelling point" and calling it a day. If you go something like 90% flexitarian with a preference for non-factory for the remaining animal products, you won't win any purity prizes, but you're already so far off the distribution that your contribution to the problem basically doesn't matter.
I think you should (strive to) feel good or bad based more on the real consequences of your actions than whether somebody criticizes you. Somebody will always criticize you from one direction or the other for basically anything these days.
I'm not vegan; a while back I was compelled to stop eating pork after I read an essay that argued it was particularly awful to particularly smart creatures. Probably I should still feel guilty that I occasionally eat chicken and fish, but presumably I should feel LESS guilty than I did before.
"Making ‘reasonable compromises’ seems like it’s never going to make (even EA sphere!) animal advocates stop arguing that you’re evil and guilt-tripping you."
and this is why doing things to make other people stop arguing you are evil is bad decision-making algorithm. what is weird is that people that is the algorithm they follow, tend to project it all over the place. so they hear calling to listen to their own inner voice - the direct opposite of listening to other people - and to find what they, themselves, consider moral, and somehow convert it to... this.
there is alternative, that include internal moral compass, but i just don't know who to communicate that to people who read "listen to the part of you" and react with "it’s never going to make (even EA sphere!) animal advocates stop arguing that you’re evil and guilt-tripping you.".
and it's look like if people like me will write about their inner experience it will be bad for people like you, despite that fact i have zero guilt about my decisions. and i want to suggest the skill of noticing you own interpretation and the difference between it and what actually written, but i think it's the emotional problem that is in the core, and i really don't know what make some people able to say "it's right because i say so, and i am the fountainhead of all morality", wile other can't.
but... maybe start with noticing that listening to yourself and listening to guilt-tripping assholes, real and imaginary, is the direct opposite, on the axis if internal-external?
also, it' very much possible BOTH avoiding that type of sacrificed and care about animals. i'm doing that, other people do. some people have skill issues and can't, but it's fact about their limitations, not the universal impossibility of it.
Re: soya sauce, you don't like tamari? Tasty, natural and gluten free. My bottle says: water, soy, salt, koji.
Kikkoman tamari is fine for Japanese foods. But a Chinese style soy sauce has this perfect Chinese-takeout flavor which Kikkoman doesn’t. I haven’t seen a Chinese style tamari yet.
Addendum: Seriously, if you're not allergic to regular soy sauce and you like Chinese food, you should try some of the stuff marketed as "light superior soy sauce" or such on your rice or stir fries at home. See https://thewoksoflife.com/soy-sauce/ for more information.
Fair enough, you like your Chinese to stay properly Chinese. De gustibus... :) I'm not picky myself, happy to mix and match tasty ingredients from all over, from gochujang to podi powder to sambal olek to shoyu or tamari.
I'm happy to mix things! I just miss the Chinese soy sauce flavor profile.
A bit of a comment on the Christian natalism thing:
Besides the fact that:
1. most Christians are not utilitarians / consequentialists,
2. Pretty much any proposed "noble sin" in Christianity comes with an obligation for you to not do it (on pain of eternal Hellfire) and for other people to stop you
3. In general, it is considered an obligation for there to continue to be a future Church
I think that this kind of statistical approach to people being expected to suffer Hellfire will tend to smack of Calvinism and excessive pessimism about salvation to people who aren't Calvinists -- even people who very much believe that a significant number of people potentially go to Hell.
What do you think of the argument that "weird" causes like shrimp welfare turn people against EA as a whole. Of course, you can be an EA and give exclusively to Givewell's Global Development Fund or something, but you'll still be associated with weird shrimp people. At some level of weirdness, people who would otherwise give to AMF do not because their perception of EA-ness has been sullied. It's not unheard of: some people absolutely refuse to be vegan because of PETA's antics and weird vegans online.
I have tried to talk to some of my friends about EA but they are turned off by what they perceive to be "AI God" theories. These people are givers. They already give to non-EA charities but don't want to be associated with the weirdos.
Has this kind of survey been done? It could be done among the general population and among people who regularly give to non-EA charities. How many of them would give to EA charities if it wasn't so heavily association with "weird" causes? How many human lives are being left at the table? How many shrimp are worth a single malaria death?
so here is my honest option - if i need to chose between people who refuse to save the life of kids because they found the association of AI off-putting, and people who aim to do the most good, even when it's low status and weird, it's blindingly obvious who i want to have in my movement. and less then 10% of my donations go to AI-related causes.
i will lose a lot of respect to any person who actually say that they will not send money to save children from malaria because there are weird nerds there, and it's so low status. like, how this is not supervillain level bad?
that is obviously evil, and it is obviously bad for any movement that aim for doing good to court that sort of people. that attitude is morally corrosive. the fact that EA actively repel those people is good, and if it stop it will become yet another generic sad-puppies-diaereses movement with time.
the ability of EA do what is right even if it's weird is in the core of it. give that away, and with time you will lose everything.
Yep, this is my take. The thing that EA is-- which is good and precious-- is that we report honestly what we think the best charities are without attention to PR considerations. If you want to shade the truth in order to get people to do things that seem net-positive, there's a great place to do that, which is the rest of the charity world.
Well, for instance, GiveWell doesn't put any money towards AI or shrimp, right? I don't think it calls itself an "EA charity." Maybe rather than arguing the merits of EA, just try to convince your friends that these particular charities do the most good most efficiently?
I dunno
I gave to GiveWell as an extremely not-EA-aligned person who thinks that Givewell-style optimization is worth doing, but I'm also a somewhat unsocial weirdo even within my particular decidedly dissident political sphere.
Givewell never seemed connected to "AI god" talk from my perspective but I may just be inured to "AI god" talk.
Why "It feels morally unconscionable to let children die to save animals—as it should be." instead of, say, "It feels morally unconscionable to save the life of someone who will almost certainly personally fund the torture of many many beings who also deserve happiness—as it should be.."
I mean. Yes. Killing people for moral violations that they might commit in the future is bad.
I said not-save-people not kill-people.
On this particular topic, I think many people understandably feel like that's not a particularly virtuous distinction even if it is a real one.
B’s Bulldog gets higher engagement when he writes about animal well fare is because otherwise he writes about the Fine Tuning argument for God’s existence, which just pisses most of his audience off
based B's Bulldog audience