What Would Change My Thoughts?

Right here, I name on EconLog readers to attempt to change my thoughts!

Let me begin this out with a proverbial throat-clearing on what everyone knows are the well-worn difficulties of adjusting somebody’s thoughts. Doing so is usually very troublesome, and persons are reluctant to vary their thoughts. And we’re all biased to consider we’re all extra open-minded than we really are. That mentioned, I do assume I’m higher than most at being keen to vary my thoughts, even on very basic points which have main life implications. Two examples – for a big fraction of my life, I used to be a fairly religious and believing Christian. However I’m now an atheist, as a result of I encountered quite a lot of arguments I discovered convincing and thus modified my thoughts on the topic. (This additionally makes me considerably skeptical when individuals say issues like “it’s pointless to debate faith, no person ever modifications their thoughts,” as a result of I actually did, and I do know many others who’ve as nicely, for a similar causes as me.) Second, I used to have such a meat-heavy weight loss plan that I used to be fairly near individuals who abide by the so-called “carnivore weight loss plan” in the present day. However I learn Michael Huemer’s debate with Bryan Caplan over moral vegetarianism, and I ended consuming meat that very same day, as a result of I discovered Huemer’s arguments way more highly effective and convincing than Caplan’s. I felt no issue with abandoning my lifelong non secular beliefs or essentially altering my weight loss plan and way of life as soon as coming throughout persuasive arguments that have been opposite to my very own views at the moment.

So, right here’s a number of issues I consider to be true which are, I believe, controversial sufficient that a variety of readers would dispute. Now, I’m not asking you to attempt to adjudicate the difficulty within the feedback right here – there’s solely a lot one can do in a weblog publish or a remark. As a substitute, in the event you disagree with my tackle one thing, what would you maintain up as the perfect, strongest, most persuasive account for the alternative view – an argument you’d personally be keen to log off on? Relying on what comes by way of, I’ll decide one and skim it, and would possibly flip my response into certainly one of my multi-post in depth critiques.

With that stage now set, right here’s a number of concepts I keep in mind.

Ethical realism – the concept that there are goal ethical details about what is true and unsuitable, independently of what anybody thinks about them. That’s, if Nazi Germany had gained WWII and gone on to overcome the whole world, and all subsequent generations had been raised to consider that the Holocaust was an excellent good, it will nonetheless be the case that the Holocaust was unsuitable. Whereas this isn’t precisely an unpopular view of mine (ethical realism is the majority view amongst philosophers, in any case), there’s nonetheless sufficient disagreement on the market to make it price exploring. When you incline in direction of ethical antirealism, what e book or article or essay do you assume makes the perfect case?
There’s nothing morally particular in regards to the state. By this I don’t imply state motion isn’t justified. What I imply is that there’s nothing that justifies coercion by the state that doesn’t additionally equally justify coercion for a person. If a state of affairs doesn’t justify coercion on the a part of a person, it doesn’t justify state coercion both. Once more, this doesn’t imply that justified state motion is an empty set – as a result of justified particular person coercion can also be not an empty set. However the two units are equal, or so it appears to me. Moreover, I reject what Jason Brennan calls the “particular immunity thesis” in favor of the “ethical parity thesis.” That’s, the actions of the state are to be evaluated by the identical ethical requirements as another individual or group, and may be justly resisted on the identical foundation. When you disagree and consider that the justness of coercion relies upon not on the circumstances creating the justification however fairly on who is doing the coercing, what’s the perfect argument supporting this? Or in the event you consider that brokers of the state get pleasure from a particular ethical immunity in opposition to being resisted when appearing unjustly, what argument do you assume makes the strongest case for this?
Equality of consequence has no intrinsic worth. Whereas there could be instrumental advantages to equality of consequence, the advantages are instrumental solely. In fact, being “merely” instrumentally useful doesn’t imply one thing is unimportant. However nonetheless, equality of consequence has no worth in and of itself. Think about one world of huge, crippling, and equal poverty, and one other world the place no person suffers from any poverty however some are higher off than others. Somebody who believes within the intrinsic worth of equal outcomes may nonetheless settle for that the second world is healthier total – they could permit that the intrinsic worth of equal outcomes is outweighed by the instrumental worth of eliminating poverty. However they’d nonetheless need to argue that there’s a minimum of some sense wherein the primary world is healthier, even when the second is healthier total. To me, there isn’t any sense wherein the primary world is healthier – equality of distress and struggling doesn’t create an offsetting good by advantage of its equality. However in the event you do assume that there’s actual, intrinsic worth on equal outcomes, what’s the finest argument you possibly can level me to?
There is no such thing as a coherent idea of aggregated choices or preferences. That’s, phrases like “we as a society have determined” such and such are at the perfect a deceptive shorthand, and at worst are essentially incoherent. There is no such thing as a significant sense wherein particular person choices may be aggregated into an total social choice, or particular person preferences someway common out to a significant social desire. However maybe you disagree, and consider that there’s some deeply significant idea of social preferences. If that’s the case, inform me who makes the strongest argument for that case and the place I can discover it.