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Effective altruism + Leibniz's influence on Kant + Would you walk away?

#1
C C Offline
Leibniz’s Influence on Kant (substantive revision)
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kant-leibniz/

Kant took Leibniz’s as a failed dogmatic enterprise in metaphysics and philosophical theology, but as one that was partially redeemed by its parallel treatment of nature and value.


Ursula Le Guin’s “The Ones who Walk Away from Omelas”: Would You Walk Away?
https://1000wordphilosophy.com/2022/05/19/omelas/

One question this story raises is when, if ever, is it permissible to sacrifice one person for the good of a greater number of people? Different moral theories provide different answers.


How effective altruism went from a niche movement to a billion-dollar force
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2022/...tocurrency

INTRO: Seven years ago, I was invited to my first EA Global, the flagship conference of the effective altruism movement. I was fascinated by effective altruism (EA), which defines itself as “using evidence and reason to figure out how to benefit others as much as possible,” in large part because of the moral seriousness of its practitioners.

My first piece on EA, from 2013, tracked three people who were “earning to give”: taking high-paying jobs in sectors like tech or finance for the express purpose of giving half or more of their earnings away to highly effective charities, where the money could save lives. I’d met other EAs who made much more modest salaries but still gave a huge share of their income away, or who donated their kidneys to strangers. These were people who were willing to give up a lot — even parts of their own bodies — to help others.

So I agreed to speak at a panel at the conference. Along the way I asked if the organizers could pay for my flight and hotel, as is the norm for journalists invited to speak at events. They replied that they were short on cash — and I immediately felt like an asshole. I had asked the people at the “let’s all give our money to buy the world’s poor malaria bed nets” conference to buy me a plane ticket? Obviously the money should go to bed nets!
The 4 major criminal probes into Donald Trump, explained

Flash forward to 2021. The foundation of Sam Bankman-Fried, the crypto billionaire and dedicated effective altruist donor, announced a program meant to bring fellow EAs to the Bahamas, where his crypto exchange company FTX is headquartered for largely regulatory reasons. The 10-25 accepted applicants would receive funding for travel to and from the Bahamas, housing for “up to 6 months,” and a one-time stipend of $10,000 each. Pennies weren’t exactly being pinched anymore.

It’s safe to say that effective altruism is no longer the small, eclectic club of philosophers, charity researchers, and do-gooders it was just a decade ago. It’s an idea, and group of people, with roughly $26.6 billion in resources behind them, real and growing political power, and an increasing ability to noticeably change the world.

EA, as a subculture, has always been categorized by relentless, sometimes navel-gazing self-criticism and questioning of assumptions, so this development has prompted no small amount of internal consternation. A frequent lament in EA circles these days is that there’s just too much money, and not enough effective causes to spend it on. Bankman-Fried, who got interested in EA as an undergrad at MIT, “earned to give” through crypto trading so hard that he’s now worth about $12.8 billion as of this writing, almost all of which he has said he plans to give away to EA-aligned causes. (Disclosure: Future Perfect, which is partly supported through philanthropic giving, received a project grant from Building a Stronger Future, Bankman-Fried’s philanthropic arm.)

Along with the size of its collective bank account, EA’s priorities have also changed. For a long time, much of the movement’s focus was on “near-termist” goals: reducing poverty or preventable death or factory farming abuses right now, so humans and animals can live better lives in the near-term.

But as the movement has grown richer, it is also increasingly becoming “longtermist.” That means embracing an argument that because so many more humans and other intelligent beings could live in the future than live today, the most important thing for altruistic people to do in the present moment is to ensure that that future comes to be at all by preventing existential risks — and that it’s as good as possible. The impending release of What We Owe to the Future, an anticipated treatise on longtermism by Oxford philosopher and EA co-founder Will MacAskill, is indicative of the shift... (MORE - missing details)
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#2
confused2 Offline
“The Ones who Walk Away from Omelas”
I haven't read the story but I do know Ursula Le Guin as an excellent writer and I'm sure she would do it well and powerfully.
I think I might recently have grown or acquired a conscience - at the age of 68 for the benefit of anyone new to the forum (this may appear in its own thread) - also coincidentally toothache. Both make it hard to sleep. For the first time I start to understand 'prisoners of conscience'.
A take on the Omelas dilemma might be that if you have just one person willing to take on the role of the the child for the sake of the rest then .. it only works if they can swap and the child is freed. In a fictional world that might break the curse and everyone lives happily ever after. In the real world there are many instances where the metaphor applies and swapping places isn't an option.
As I understand the US civil war it was about 'people should not be in that (enslaved) situation for the enrichment of others' - there was a real civil war and many people died on both sides.
My newly minted conscience has features I may not be fully aware of yet.
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#3
Syne Offline
Omelas is an easy dilemma. No one in the city is really doing anything for the benefit of others. They are all using the child for their own selfish happiness. Anyone else's happiness is just a side effect. They simple use each other as a mutual justification for their collective evil. Consequentialism is always vulnerable to this kind of perverse math, because it completely discounts motive as being morally relevant.

The supposed challenges for Kant are just as easy. There is no moral problem with distributing a vaccine....unless you are coercing or mandating people to take it, and/or doing so without informed consent of the possible risks. I don't know that military draft has ever been moral. Fighting and killing for a just cause can be, but again, coercing people to do so runs afoul of those mandating thinking their motives and better than, and should trump, yours.

Personally, I've walked away from several Omelas. I'm currently boycotting several things that I would otherwise enjoy. If principles exist at all, they should have more value than appetites and comforts.
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#4
confused2 Offline
Some Star Trek philosophy..

Context: The crew of the Enterprise have previously rescued Spock at great risk to the entire crew.

Later in the [another] film, when crewman Chekov is in trouble, Spock insists that the crew save him, even at risk of jeopardizing the crew’s vital mission to save Earth and everyone on it. Kirk asks, “Is this the logical thing to do?” Spock answers, “No, but it is the human thing to do.” Although Spock reaffirms his claim that the needs of the many logically outweigh the needs of the few, he suggests that sometimes we must do the “human” thing, not the logical thing, and put the needs of the few (or the one) first.

More: https://theobjectivestandard.com/2013/09...f-the-few/

There's a problem in that 'the human thing to do' is what humans actually do not what an ideal [by whose definition?] human would (or should) do. I note in passing that those from an elitist background aren't just a little bit elitist - they're totally dyed in the wool elitist - the prime directive is (maybe) the accumulation of wealth and power. To what extent are people with principles nothing more than fair game to those without?
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#5
Syne Offline
(Aug 25, 2022 08:52 AM)confused2 Wrote: To what extent are people with principles nothing more than fair game to those without?

Depends on the principles. If you're a sworn pacifist, you're also likely a de facto victim. But if your principles include good people defending themselves, perhaps with lethal force, and fighting bad people to protect the weak, the unprincipled have no special advantage.
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