Philosophical Vegan Forum

inator wrote: Usually you define fairness as getting merit-based returns. Not equality, but equal opportunity and all that stuff.

Which is basically what we have. Although isn't it also fair for a parent to be able to give to his or her child (being able to give your fairly earned money to whomever you choose)? And yet the child earned nothing on merit.
In capitalism, money (and good investment, or even mediocre investment in a good economy) begets more money.

inator wrote: A more substantive inheritance tax should take care of that.

Yes, that could help equalize things. But is that a good thing? It depends on how the tax is used, and how the rich would spend their money, and whether it would discourage people from working hard.

inator wrote: But it is fair to adjust for the unfairness within the contract if the practical results clearly indicate that it exists.

Maybe not fair, but possibly good. It will be "unfair" either way, from different perspectives. Whether you take away fairly earned money, or leave an inequality in means.

inator wrote: Then the game is rigged. Fix the contract. Or don’t, if the current contract results in better overall outcomes. But usually it won’t. It’s a matter of testing if that’s the case.

Right, but the true metric is consequential outcome, and not "fairness".

inator wrote: It's clear which demonstrate more altruistic value. So the right kind of consequence is the one maximizing well-being achieved through altruistic means in your view?

That's about it.
Anything else is basically a force of nature, and not up to will or choice.

We prefer the case where the tornado didn't destroy the town, but since nobody caused it, we can't say that was the less moral outcome. It just sucked.
This notion may be some kind of residual superstitious belief in the agency of nature (something theists would advocate).

Now if somebody had the power to control weather and prevented the tornado, that would be a moral good since it was done to help others.

inator wrote: First I thought that the results of the two systems should be the same, but people have different levels of ability, so I guess the first one should generate more egalitarian results than the latter. But then the sum total of the benefits should be the same.

Not necessarily, since goods have diminishing returns. Egoism can result in a master class and a slave class, where the slaves' misery greatly outweighs the masters' pleasure, since even if it's just slightly beneficial to the masters and causes enormous suffering to others, they should do it as rational egoists.

Comparing utilitarianism and consequential altruism, the results are much closer (probably nearly identical, except for in extreme cases).

inator wrote: Traditional normative moral theories fall into three types - Teleological theories seek to identify some supreme end or best way of life, and reduce the right and the virtuous to the promotion of this good.

When good is contextual, I think this makes it harder for people to understand. Utilitarianism is easy for people to understand, though fraught with problems. It's better just to talk about consequentialism as opposed to deontology, since additional divisions are logically problematic, and may not encompass all variants.

inator wrote:Deontological theories seek to identify a supreme principle or laws of morality independent of the good, and subordinate the pursuit of the good to conformity with the moral law, independent of consequences.

Except deontologists may say they recognize obedience to those laws as the only good, so there is no other "good" to consider.
The trouble with deontology is two fold:
1. It provides no means of resolving conflicts of interests, or deciding on a course of action given options, since it will not compare consequences or degrees of things
2. The derivation of its principles is arbitrary (categorical imperative), since it refuses to consider individual cases.

The solution to the second (since nobody can will that his or her will be violated) only exacerbates the first problem, since there is no means of comparison, and people are always violating somebody's will on one or more fronts. It leads to inability to act unless every other will is in complete agreement with what you should do.

inator wrote:Virtue theories take phenomena of approval and disapproval to be fundamental, and derive the right and the good from them. They are based on the spontaneous tendencies of observers to approve and disapprove of people's conduct, not just on taking actions that lead to the most moral ends.

Virtue ethics is a mess, in terms of derivation and application. I've read explanations and formulations that can fit into consequentialism, and others that fit into deontology. I don't think mainstream academic philosophy is smart enough to realize that these systems are inconsistent within this field, and that they boil down to consequential or deontological ethics. Mainstream academic philosophy doesn't even realize deontology is broken, so I shouldn't be surprised.

It's very much how people think there are dozens of interpretations of quantum mechanics, when there are really only three, out of which one is disproved by Bell's inequality, and another is absurd.

inator wrote:For example (virtue): You can still be a pretty shitty person even if the totality of the consequences of your actions isn't less moral than a nice person's.
I'll donate 1 milion$ to a charity for animals and continue being a carnist. I'm doing way more good for the animals than my vegan neighbour who struggles to put food on the table for their family. But that's only when you look at things in absolute terms. Relative to my means, I'm doing less, so I'm the less virtuous person.

This deals with judgement of people, not actions. This is not incompatible with consequentialism. Consequentialism makes it possible to judge the actions people have taken, and then you can look at the means of the person and compare people (those with more means who have done less good being less good people). Judging actions and people is a distinct endeavor, you're mistaking the two.

inator wrote:A person is a carnist because they've never come in contact with veganism and they don't possess the mental faculties to come up with the logic of veganism on their own. There are immoral consequences of their actions, but they’re not really an immoral person because of that.
Another person is a carnist although they understand and even agree with the vegan logic but "bacon tho". Same consequences, very different levels of virtue.

Right. Again, this is about judging people, which comes with context.
This is not opposed to consequentialism, but a complementary mechanism of going beyond judging actions to judging the relative merits of different wills based on their capacities to do good or bad.

Morality can be sabotaged in three (non distinct) places:

Will (having an ill will, or being apathetic to others)
Knowledge (having incorrect knowledge or lacking knowledge which leads to bad action)
Action (being unable to do certain moral actions due to limitations in means or capacity)

We can look at each of these on their own terms.

It's easy enough to say a person is inherently good "at heart" because a will as they have when put into another context results in good, but that the person is unable or lacks the knowledge or means to do good.

Now here's a question for you (one I believe I've addressed elsewhere, but I'm curious if you can puzzle it out):
When does false knowledge become the inherent fault of the person, rather than innocent ignorance?
When can we say a person is a bad person because that person has false knowledge which is leading to bad action?

inator wrote:And the intention behind what you do also says something about your virtue, even though the result might go to shit due to miscalculation.

Well, there is such a thing as just bad luck. We will make mistakes, what matters is that our mechanisms of action are reliable on average.
If you did something that, 99% of the time turns out good and 1% of the time turns out bad, wherein the good of the 99% outweighs the bad of the 1%, and just had bad luck and happened to do harm the one time you did it, you still acted morally.
For example, if you gave somebody antibiotics to cure an infection that the person had a high chance of dying from, but the person had a rare reaction to the antibiotics and died, and might have lived had you not intervened. It's still good, because that kind of action is good on average, and you had no way of knowing it wouldn't be in that instance.

inator wrote:But what about if your actions accidentally result in moral consequences?

You don't get credit for that. Let's say you fire a machine gun into a crowded movie theater, and by dumb luck you happen to kill a suicide bomber and no civilians before the bomber detonated the bomb. Good consequences, but you had no way of knowing they would be. You're still a bad person, and the action you took was bad since 99.999999% of the time it will be.

inator wrote:You're not wrong, BUT I think there's more to it:
Any clear disproportion in sex, race or any other arbitrary criteria like that within those jobs means that there is something causing it, since differences between those groups of people are not that large.

How do we know that? Nurture contributes so much, it may even be completely derived from that. And why does it matter if differences are nature or nurture, if they're that deep seated?
It probably has the most to do with early childhood, and social modeling.
And what is free will anyway?

inator wrote:This sort of discrimination might not matter to the overall economy ( I don't know, that should be verified empirically), but it does matter to people.

But it doesn't really matter to people. People only get upset about it when you make studies and tell them they're underpaid. Otherwise, they're making enough that they don't really notice the differences.
You're causing a problem by telling people there's a problem.

I went into the same thing with Volenta in another thread about NSA spying.
People are upset about the spying (and may hypothetically adjust their behavior slightly -- although it's not clear this is bad) because they know about it and it makes them uncomfortable to know about it, and because we're fear mongering and telling people what a big problem it is, and one of the major arguments for why it's a problem is that people are upset about it/hypothetically changing their behavior because they know about it.

If we just stop talking about some of these things which are in fact innocuous and only bother people when we tell them it's a problem and get them riled up over more or less nothing, we will stop inventing more problems for ourselves.

The bottom line is that we're all equal before the law. That's what people see, and that's what makes people most upset when inequality manifests. Everything else can be easily written off as people's choices (and in terms of research, it's impossible to get solid evidence to the contrary through all of the noise of human choice).

inator wrote:If a group of individuals feels underrepresented in a "good" (desirable) category of jobs or whatever, they'll be less satisfied.

Then don't tell them about it. Do the opposite, and instead of saying there's a misrepresentation, highlight the individuals that do represent them. Make female and minority scientists more famous and well known, instead of advertising the supposed wage gap and racial discrimination.

Why try to "solve" a problem that doesn't really exist the hard way? Just stop making it a problem, and if there's an issue of perception, focus on that instead, which is a much more practical and affordable solution.

inator wrote: It's like what you said about genders in another thread: Until we evolve to stop seing gender and sexuality as relevant criteria, it does make sense to promote the lgbt cause.

My main concern is the residual legal problems. Equality before the law -- that is important.

inator wrote: Does that ultimately hurt women? Yes, if they end up getting payed less.

Being paid slightly less, but still well within the range of a living wage, is not necessarily harmful. Sometimes it's even helpful, because disposable income may be spent on drugs and junk food, etc. and larger sums of money are wasted more easily. Look at how winning the lottery harms people.
I'd want to see evidence that a slightly lower wage is harmful, since I think the opposite is true for most people.

It's more likely that the only thing that's harmful is people making women upset by telling them they're making less.

Studies have repeatedly shown that the only way people (of reasonable, living, means) become less satisfied with their lives is when they compare themselves with people of greater means. Those who do not compare themselves to richer people and feel inferior because of it report similar levels of happiness and life satisfaction.
More money does not make people happier, as long as they have enough to begin with.

Leisure time and time with family has a better correlation with happiness and life satisfaction. That's something men have much less of.

inator wrote: Then again, should we care that females and not other human beings are getting payed less? Yes, if they identify as female and they feel disadvantaged economically as a result of their identity. If you feel like you're getting disadvantaged economically as a result of your own (lack of) merit or ability rather than your identity, then you might feel better about it. Fairness works both ways. Attitudes are important.

Then we need to focus on attitudes. Which means we have to end this feminist advertising campaign to make women feel bad about making less for being women, whether it's true or not. Certainly not support it, because it's probably not going to change anything anyway, and it just wastes our time and money.
We need to stop wasting resources to make people feel bad about themselves, or up in arms about imaginary injustices, for no reason.

inator wrote:For now, I don't really see how it could hurt to reach out to potential vegans and acknowledge their different needs and difficulties though. It might just not be very cost-effective.

If it is effective, that's just regular vegan advocacy. It's about meeting people where they are. That's not intersectionalism.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Which is basically what we have. Although isn't it also fair for a parent to be able to give to his or her child (being able to give your fairly earned money to whomever you choose)? And yet the child earned nothing on merit.

Well the parent-child relationship is highly irrational, but you can’t force individuals to use their resources in the rational ‘altruistic consequentionalist’ kind of way. You can only adjust the system, if that will create the wanted results. Or maybe you can create stronger incentives for the rich to become very charitable, like them getting more social status according to their charitabless (which is usually what money does). But that's a long shot. And anyway, a centralized system of deciding where the money is needed and where it should go is usually better than all that depending on the whims and fancies of many individuals.

This sort of example is one of the dilemmas that I'm always struggling with. As an objective observer, I don't know what's fair in this case and similar cases, it depends on whether you take an individualistic ‘personal rights’-based perspective or an ‘altruistic consequentionalist’ perspective on this one single event.
Since the main consideration is which of the two creates more well-being on the macro scale, I guess we’ll have to test it and the answer to that will be the right course of action.

brimstoneSalad wrote:In capitalism, money (and good investment, or even mediocre investment in a good economy) begets more money.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Yes, that could help equalize things. But is that a good thing? It depends on how the tax is used, and how the rich would spend their money, and whether it would discourage people from working hard.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Not necessarily, since goods have diminishing returns. Egoism can result in a master class and a slave class, where the slaves' misery greatly outweighs the masters' pleasure, since even if it's just slightly beneficial to the masters and causes enormous suffering to others, they should do it as rational egoists.

Yes, compounding is the main factor behind this growing inequality. And if you pass that on from generation to generation, it can even become extreme. It’s not unfair based on the system, it’s unfair based on the actual differences in ability ("merit") present in people.

My main concern is what creates more well-being, not just a good overall economy. Since goods have diminishing returns in terms of well-being, why would it make sense for the system to encourage exponential financial returns?

brimstoneSalad wrote:

inator wrote:But it is fair to adjust for the unfairness within the contract if the practical results clearly indicate that it exists.

Maybe not fair, but possibly good. It will be "unfair" either way, from different perspectives. Whether you take away fairly earned money, or leave an inequality in means.

inator wrote:Then the game is rigged. Fix the contract. Or don’t, if the current contract results in better overall outcomes. But usually it won’t. It’s a matter of testing if that’s the case.

Right, but the true metric is consequential outcome, and not "fairness".

We don’t disagree on this, consequential 'good' is the main concern, not 'fair'. I just seem to think that the two overlap more frequently.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Comparing utilitarianism and consequential altruism, the results are much closer (probably nearly identical, except for in extreme cases).

I see that now.

brimstoneSalad wrote:We prefer the case where the tornado didn't destroy the town, but since nobody caused it, we can't say that was the less moral outcome. It just sucked.
This notion may be some kind of residual superstitious belief in the agency of nature (something theists would advocate).

Now if somebody had the power to control weather and prevented the tornado, that would be a moral good since it was done to help others.

Got it.

brimstoneSalad wrote:This deals with judgement of people, not actions. This is not incompatible with consequentialism. Consequentialism makes it possible to judge the actions people have taken, and then you can look at the means of the person and compare people (those with more means who have done less good being less good people). Judging actions and people is a distinct endeavor, you're mistaking the two.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Right. Again, this is about judging people, which comes with context.
This is not opposed to consequentialism, but a complementary mechanism of going beyond judging actions to judging the relative merits of different wills based on their capacities to do good or bad.

I simply looked at the definition of teleological theories: they “reduce the right and the virtuous to the promotion of the consequential good”. Whether or not it allows for judging actions and people outside the frame of consequences is a matter of interpretation apparently. You seem to have a more “consequences first” kind of approach, versus “only consequences”. That’s perfectly fine with me as long as I can still be judgemental of assholes.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Morality can be sabotaged in three (non distinct) places:

Will (having an ill will, or being apathetic to others)
Knowledge (having incorrect knowledge or lacking knowledge which leads to bad action)
Action (being unable to do certain moral actions due to limitations in means or capacity)

We can look at each of these on their own terms.

It's easy enough to say a person is inherently good "at heart" because a will as they have when put into another context results in good, but that the person is unable or lacks the knowledge or means to do good.

Now here's a question for you (one I believe I've addressed elsewhere, but I'm curious if you can puzzle it out):
When does false knowledge become the inherent fault of the person, rather than innocent ignorance?
When can we say a person is a bad person because that person has false knowledge which is leading to bad action?

There’s so much I could say...
When they don’t regularly reanalyze their position;
When they don’t take intelligent critique into consideration;
When they focus on getting information that reinforces their beliefs, instead of looking at a diversity of sources;
When they don’t rethink their position when presented with new information/facts.

All this would mean they’re ideological, or in more popular terms, a moron. The problem is that most, if not all people do these to some extent. If you can prove that this behaviour is based on a lack of intelligence, then once again that would mean it’s not their fault.

By the way, I think this virtue thing is also where the whole abolitionist/anti-welfare mindset comes from. You care about having virtuous vegan people more than you care about the consequences for animals.
You can halve your meat intake - I'll still think you're a terrible person, so I can't encourage you to do so.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Well, there is such a thing as just bad luck. We will make mistakes, what matters is that our mechanisms of action are reliable on average.
If you did something that, 99% of the time turns out good and 1% of the time turns out bad, wherein the good of the 99% outweighs the bad of the 1%, and just had bad luck and happened to do harm the one time you did it, you still acted morally.
For example, if you gave somebody antibiotics to cure an infection that the person had a high chance of dying from, but the person had a rare reaction to the antibiotics and died, and might have lived had you not intervened. It's still good, because that kind of action is good on average, and you had no way of knowing it wouldn't be in that instance.

Yeah, you can look at it like: Giving antibiotics is good because, on average, it creates good results...

brimstoneSalad wrote:How do we know that? Nurture contributes so much, it may even be completely derived from that. And why does it matter if differences are nature or nurture, if they're that deep seated?
It probably has the most to do with early childhood, and social modeling.
And what is free will anyway?

I'm unconvinced that it's exclusively about nurture, but yes, it’s more important. Which is good, because nurture is the only playground you have for fixing things, if you need to.
Free will is an illusion. Which kind of makes judging people redundant in the first place.

brimstoneSalad wrote:I went into the same thing with Volenta in another thread about NSA spying.

I’ll look into that.

brimstoneSalad wrote:But it doesn't really matter to people. People only get upset about it when you make studies and tell them they're underpaid. Otherwise, they're making enough that they don't really notice the differences.
You're causing a problem by telling people there's a problem.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Why try to "solve" a problem that doesn't really exist the hard way? Just stop making it a problem, and if there's an issue of perception, focus on that instead, which is a much more practical and affordable solution.

Should we stop making studies that might result in upsetting information, should we just stop reporting on them?
Yes, withholding (or just not researching) this type of information might be a course of action to make people happier, but how can you control information in this day and age? Informers are also people and they interpret things the way that their readers/watchers etc. would. They have the same mindset: inequality is bad in itself. Unless you're Fox News or the Daily Mail or something, but 'they're not even wrong'. It’s once again a problem of decision-makers being agents in the game.

Manipulating people’s perception and attitudes, like highlighting female and minority people and downplaying the numbers, is another course of action – but you get the same problem as above. Who's objective and in charge of the information that you can talk to? How do you stop feminism and everything else that results from the perception of inequality?

Fixing the inequality is another course of action - also difficult.

Stopping people from caring about inequality by making them realize that categorizing people like that is trivial– amazing, but almost impossible for now.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Studies have repeatedly shown that the only way people (of reasonable, living, means) become less satisfied with their lives is when they compare themselves with people of greater means. Those who do not compare themselves to richer people and feel inferior because of it report similar levels of happiness and life satisfaction.
More money does not make people happier, as long as they have enough to begin with.
Leisure time and time with family has a better correlation with happiness and life satisfaction. That's something men have much less of.

This is true.

Let’s ship off the poor to another continent so they won’t come in contact with the rich all the time. Or the other way around. And stop reporting on how they’re doing to the other group. The poor will feel better since they won’t feel so extremely inferior all the time, but I guess the effect will be reversed for the rich.

More money does make people happier because they do compare themselves to others and it becomes a matter of social status and power rather than actual goods. Less money makes people feel shitty for the same reason (excluding people who live in actual poverty). Attitudes.
I suppose the problem here is that the distribution in the’ rich’ and ‘poor’ categories is so extremely unequal, that less people can feel good about their superiority than others can feel bad about their inferiority. So the overall result is negative.

You can try to fix these perceptions by stopping the information that makes the unfairness visible, or by stopping the unfairness. Stopping how perceptions work though (‘listen kids, these differences between people don’t actually matter, so neither does unfairness’)… that’s a lost cause for now.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Then we need to focus on attitudes. Which means we have to end this feminist advertising campaign to make women feel bad about making less for being women, whether it's true or not. Certainly not support it, because it's probably not going to change anything anyway, and it just wastes our time and money.
We need to stop wasting resources to make people feel bad about themselves, or up in arms about imaginary injustices, for no reason.

Well it's not an imaginary injustice - if women do get payed less, then it's unfair (no matter the societal cause for that - simply in terms of ‘potential’). The question is whether this unfairness is really directly conducive to less overall well-being. That I don't know and it's an interesting question.
We pretty much know by now that it’s affecting it indirectly, through attitudes.

brimstoneSalad wrote:If it is effective, that's just regular vegan advocacy. It's about meeting people where they are. That's not intersectionalism.

Yes, theoretically that's true.
The idea behind intersectionalism, as I understand it, doesn't really contradict regular vegan advocacy or necessarily claim it's something too different. It's just a chapter of it because, in practice, mainstream advocacy sometimes forgets to address the specific needs of some categories of potential vegans.
That's because the people doing the advocacy don't usually belong to those categories, OR, even if they do belong to that category, they still don't focus on its specific needs, since that would restrict their personal ability to reach more people overall.

But if you think about it, the main bulk of the audience is hit with the message from multiple mainstream sources anyway. So wouldn't it be more effective for one 'black male bodybuilder vegan' to talk about the specific needs of black male bodybuilder potential vegans and only reach them? Sure, then that activist would reach a limited number of people on his own and think "I'm not being as effective as xyz", but he's actually doing a favor to the movement because his audience are people who are difficult to reach with the dilute version of the message. And his audience might also be more engaged because their specific needs are being addressed so well.

It's like having the VA and this forum. It's regular vegan advocacy, yes, but it also intersects with atheism. It's a matter of deciding how many issues to intersect in one place, in order to keep the audience engaged enough, but also not restrict its numbers too much.
So yes, the mainstream message has to be dilute, but it's also good to try to include diverse voices that speak to more specific audiences.

Unless I'm misunderstanding intersectionalism and it actually says "the WHOLE vegan movement should focus on feminism AND black male bodybuilding AND lgbt issues and and", and then my head will explode.

inator wrote: Since the main consideration is which of the two creates more well-being on the macro scale, I guess we’ll have to test it and the answer to that will be the right course of action.

Right. The bottom line being that we can't make assumptions that arbitrary values like "fair" will result in good outcomes. There is substantial overlap, but there are also many cases where it's either nebulous or counterproductive.

So, I say fair is not good. But that doesn't mean fair is bad either. Sometimes fair isn't even fair, because it's internally contradictory or comes up against competing visions of fairness.

inator wrote: Since goods have diminishing returns in terms of well-being, why would it make sense for the system to encourage exponential financial returns?

Potentially because of the ways in which very rich people spend their money as opposed to the middle class.

Look at how Bill Gates spends the vast majority of his money, compared to how that money might be spent if it were more equally distributed.
There are rich assholes that spend money on stupid stuff, but for the most part, the very rich spend proportionally more on charity and less on themselves because of those diminishing returns on personal expenditure. Either that, or they reinvest it, which is spending it on the economy and promoting new businesses and new technologies, which is better for everybody.

Rich people who spend their money stupidly don't stay rich long.

inator wrote: We don’t disagree on this, consequential 'good' is the main concern, not 'fair'. I just seem to think that the two overlap more frequently.

They overlap quite often, but they also conflict, so it's important to remind people that fair is not good, because that kind of thinking could create a counter-productive dogma.

inator wrote: Whether or not it allows for judging actions and people outside the frame of consequences is a matter of interpretation apparently.

No, it requires it. What are the consequences of judgement?
Judgement exists, and must exist, because of its consequences -- both personally in helping us understand the kind of people we should aspire to be, and socially.

inator wrote: There’s so much I could say...
When they don’t regularly reanalyze their position;
When they don’t take intelligent critique into consideration;
When they focus on getting information that reinforces their beliefs, instead of looking at a diversity of sources;
When they don’t rethink their position when presented with new information/facts.

In essence, when they identify with their beliefs.

There's a big difference between a person who happens to believe that a god exists and that the bible is true, and a person who identifies -- as the core of his or her being and personal identity -- as a Christian who believes those things by definition.

A person who just happens to believe it is just ignorant, a person who identifies existentially as that belief being a core part of his or her personhood IS ignorance; he or she has claimed this and owned it by matter of choice of personal identity.

inator wrote: If you can prove that this behaviour is based on a lack of intelligence, then once again that would mean it’s not their fault.

The trick is that they own it as a core part of their personal identities -- then it is undeniably their fault, if it is a fault.
Anything else can be easily disowned.

inator wrote: By the way, I think this virtue thing is also where the whole abolitionist/anti-welfare mindset comes from.

I don't think people think it out that much, but deontology is the reason people reject the idea of the possibility of "humane" meat; they ascribe interests that animals (humans included) just don't broadly have, like the "right" not to be used even without harm.

inator wrote: You can halve your meat intake - I'll still think you're a terrible person, so I can't encourage you to do so.

You can certainly say they're less terrible people, and we could encourage people to be less terrible.

inator wrote:Free will is an illusion. Which kind of makes judging people redundant in the first place.

Not when it's consequentially meaningful.

inator wrote: Should we stop making studies that might result in upsetting information, should we just stop reporting on them?

If it's not useful, then we shouldn't waste money on studying them either. Reporting, or more importantly, misinforming people, exaggerating, and stirring people up with rhetoric are the most to blame though.

inator wrote:but how can you control information in this day and age?

We probably can't, but we can call them assholes.

inator wrote:How do you stop feminism and everything else that results from the perception of inequality?

We probably just have to try our best to promote rational consequential ethics over dogmatic ones, and oppose its encroachment where we find it.

inator wrote:Stopping people from caring about inequality by making them realize that categorizing people like that is trivial– amazing, but almost impossible for now.

Certainly, it's not easy. We mainly have to use a top-down approach, in informing those who are most rational and will be amenable to argument first.

inator wrote:Let’s ship off the poor to another continent so they won’t come in contact with the rich all the time. Or the other way around.

It's probably important for the rich to come in contact with the poor. This is more of an attitude problem, and it's also a mostly Western problem. The poor in many Asian countries, being more family oriented and 'collectivist', don't worry as much about what others have. Less ambition -- which is good and bad in different ways.

inator wrote:but I guess the effect will be reversed for the rich.

Rich who do that just keep comparing themselves to richer people. It's a mindset issue. We don't usually feel better when we compare ourselves to poorer or miserable people, but we can feel better when we help miserable people.
The way rich become happy is by moving past materialism, and adopting issues, like helping others. That's why they would benefit from exposure to the poor if it generates empathy.

inator wrote:More money does make people happier because they do compare themselves to others and it becomes a matter of social status and power rather than actual goods.

It just perpetuates the issue. Like more drugs doesn't make people happy, because we build up tolerances, and just look for more.

inator wrote:You can try to fix these perceptions by stopping the information that makes the unfairness visible, or by stopping the unfairness. Stopping how perceptions work though (‘listen kids, these differences between people don’t actually matter, so neither does unfairness’)… that’s a lost cause for now.

I would say both are difficult issues, but the former actually works on a one by one basis -- the latter is much more difficult to spread in that way. People can learn, and then feel better, and convey that to others. If a better attitude goes viral, that's probably the best means.
Anti-consumerist attitudes can help the poor, as well as be much cheaper (and possible) than just making everybody rich.

inator wrote:Well it's not an imaginary injustice - if women do get payed less, then it's unfair (no matter the societal cause for that - simply in terms of ‘potential’).

When there's no real evidence of it that controls for choice, I don't think we can call it anything but imagined.
What is "justice"?
We already talked about legal equality, and how it's fair based on the rules at hand.

inator wrote:So wouldn't it be more effective for one 'black male bodybuilder vegan' to talk about the specific needs of black male bodybuilder potential vegans and only reach them?

Probably. This would be like having feminist vegans approach feminists from a feminist angle. That's just good marketing. It's about meeting people where they are.
The problem with intersectionality is that isn't it, although it's what some people are trying to make intersectionality sound like.

inator wrote:Unless I'm misunderstanding intersectionalism and it actually says "the WHOLE vegan movement should focus on feminism AND black male bodybuilding AND lgbt issues and and", and then my head will explode.

That's basically it. It's silly.

From the horse's mouth: http://blog.bravebirds.org/archives/1553

The idea is that by focusing on only one thing, or a limited number of things, that's racist/sexist/etc. and is counter productive to true justice (as if these different movements are stumbling over each other when they work apart and sabotage each other's progress), and once we address everything there will be a magical synergy and everybody will just 'get' social justice and all causes will be realized simultaneously since they're all based on the same premise of justice (which they really aren't, as we discussed here).

To quote myself from here: https://theveganatheist.com/forum/viewt ... =40#p15550
They fail to understand:

brimstoneSalad wrote: 1. Adversarial nature
There is no true equality in asymmetrical issues. Matters like reproductive rights are inherently asymmetrical, and obtaining something that seems fair is about compromise; that means an adversarial negotiation. That doesn't mean people have to be unfriendly, but that they're advancing different and inherently opposing interests in negotiating that compromise.

2. FAIR doesn't mean GOOD
This is something many people misunderstand, because intuitively fair feels good, and unfair feels wrong. This is deontological nonsense, and you need to understand that in order to substantiate the wrongness of something you have to provide some evidence for the ultimate and global consequences being harmful.

3. Parsimony
This is as important in charity and activism as it is in science. If asking people to "go vegan" makes people less likely to actually go vegan, we should avoid it and do something more effective. If looking like morons by being obsessively politically correct makes our outreach less effective to the majority with only minor gains from minorities, we shouldn't do it. Cost and benefit analysis is essential to any situation where we have limited resources, and both human effort and compassion are in very limited supply.

Intersectionalism is the conclusion of a blind ideology that relies on an ignorance of all three of those points.
They believe justice is the root of goodness, that it's absolutely compatible between all goals, and that once justice is realized in an equal way for all, there will be some kind of synergy that will just explode and solve all of the problems at once (of course, without any evidence of this or notion of cost).

Using a person's passion and interest in one issue to create analogies and tailor the message to inspire passion and interest in another is just good practice in persuasion and sales. That's not intersectionality. Intersectionality goes beyond that to an absurd extreme, and means supporting other issues (even counter productive ones, because they don't believe those exist) rather than just borrowing their language to reach a new audience.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Potentially because of the ways in which very rich people spend their money as opposed to the middle class.
Look at how Bill Gates spends the vast majority of his money, compared to how that money might be spent if it were more equally distributed.

Yes, but if the money is more equally distributed, there wouldn't be such a need for Bill Gates's charity.
It's not just the current rich who would get into the middle-class category (which they wouldn't for the most part anyway, if you look at how large the difference is between the 'poor to middle-class' distance vs the 'middle-class to rich' distance), but way more of the current poor would get there.

You always need redistribution, even the major religions take that into consideration. The question is what's more effective - charity-based or contract-based? Help the ones in dire need of help, or make them not need the help in the first place?

Bill Gates is great, but he's one of the hundreds of comparable means. Now if you make charitableness highly popular, then super rich people can start competing with each other in this area too for status, rather than just competing for a place on the Forbes list. You can change attitudes, but you can't change people's natural need to compete with each other. That could work as an unofficial redistribution system.

But, to reiterate my idea, the question is whether it's not simply better to have a uniform and centralized system of redistribution (including for investments in research, new technology etc.) rather than depending on the personal inclinations of a few individuals. It might be safer that way. It wouldn't even have to be nation-wide, I only mean less random than having individuals be the decision-makers over separate fragments of the overall resources. It could be regional and community-based, or multi-level. There are so many variables you can play with here.

brimstoneSalad wrote:What are the consequences of judgement?
Judgement exists, and must exist, because of its consequences -- both personally in helping us understand the kind of people we should aspire to be, and socially.

Very true.

brimstoneSalad wrote:In essence, when they identify with their beliefs.
There's a big difference between a person who happens to believe that a god exists and that the bible is true, and a person who identifies -- as the core of his or her being and personal identity -- as a Christian who believes those things by definition.
A person who just happens to believe it is just ignorant, a person who identifies existentially as that belief being a core part of his or her personhood IS ignorance; he or she has claimed this and owned it by matter of choice of personal identity.

Key word: ideology.

brimstoneSalad wrote:I don't think people think it out that much, but deontology is the reason people reject the idea of the possibility of "humane" meat; they ascribe interests that animals (humans included) just don't broadly have, like the "right" not to be used even without harm.

That's also a way of looking at it. But I'm curous: Taking an unfertilized egg from a hen that has no interest in the egg. It's morally acceptable, but I wouldn't say it's vegan. Does that mean that veganism is inherently deontological? And we're just rational people who's conclusions just happen to overlap with veganism most of the time?
Or it is or isn't vegan depending on whether you use a deontological or a consequentialist approach?

brimstoneSalad wrote:You can certainly say they're less terrible people, and we could encourage people to be less terrible.

I agree, that was me trying to find an example of how an abolitionist might think, not my personal logic.
A deontologist doesn't take into consideration degrees of right and wrong, so you're either good or you're terrible.

brimstoneSalad wrote:We probably just have to try our best to promote rational consequential ethics over dogmatic ones, and oppose its encroachment where we find it.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Certainly, it's not easy. We mainly have to use a top-down approach, in informing those who are most rational and will be amenable to argument first.

I'd like to see that happen. I'm just afraid that arguing with dogmatic ethics that can lead to good results might be divisive and counter-productive for our goals. Maybe it's better to just get out the new and better message, without purposely attacking the deontologist one. Just approach the issue on different levels, depending on who your audience is.

brimstoneSalad wrote:I would say both are difficult issues, but the former actually works on a one by one basis -- the latter is much more difficult to spread in that way. People can learn, and then feel better, and convey that to others. If a better attitude goes viral, that's probably the best means.
Anti-consumerist attitudes can help the poor, as well as be much cheaper (and possible) than just making everybody rich.

That can help. It can also help to make them richer. Let's just tackle the problem from more angles.

brimstoneSalad wrote:From the horse's mouth: http://blog.bravebirds.org/archives/1553

The idea is that by focusing on only one thing, or a limited number of things, that's racist/sexist/etc. and is counter productive to true justice (as if these different movements are stumbling over each other when they work apart and sabotage each other's progress), and once we address everything there will be a magical synergy and everybody will just 'get' social justice and all causes will be realized simultaneously since they're all based on the same premise of justice (which they really aren't, as we discussed here).

That actually does sound pretty magical and beautiful, to be honest. But then again, so do unicorns.
I'm not sure that's effective for activism,but I think it's great if they can make it happen and they should be allowed to try. It might not be completely logical, but neither is part of the audience (many liberals who are also dogmatic might respond well to this). Experiment with different approaches, as long as they doesn't start conflicting with each other too much. But I haven't seen that to be such big an issue until now.
It's just not my fight. (with or against it)

brimstoneSalad wrote:When there's no real evidence of it that controls for choice, I don't think we can call it anything but imagined.
What is "justice"?
We already talked about legal equality, and how it's fair based on the rules at hand.

brimstoneSalad wrote: 1. Adversarial nature
There is no true equality in asymmetrical issues. Matters like reproductive rights are inherently asymmetrical, and obtaining something that seems fair is about compromise; that means an adversarial negotiation. That doesn't mean people have to be unfriendly, but that they're advancing different and inherently opposing interests in negotiating that compromise.

It's not just about the pay, but also about being less present in powerful and consequently decision-making positions. This makes it more difficult for that particular category to have leverage when advocating for their interests.
Let's take a current example: the tampon tax in the UK.
First, I'm not convinced that so many women's or men's rights issues have to be adversarial. Not every issue that results from being a specific gender has to be closely related to the other gender in an adversarial way.
In this particular case, how does taxing tampons as luxuy items help men specifically? It's not a win-lose situation, it's neutral-lose.
And second, when only a bit over a quarter of the decision-making positions are filled by women (less in other countries) and the rest by men, interest representation becomes very asymmetrical. That counts especially if the issue is confrontational.

brimstoneSalad wrote: 3. Parsimony
This is as important in charity and activism as it is in science. If asking people to "go vegan" makes people less likely to actually go vegan, we should avoid it and do something more effective. If looking like morons by being obsessively politically correct makes our outreach less effective to the majority with only minor gains from minorities, we shouldn't do it. Cost and benefit analysis is essential to any situation where we have limited resources, and both human effort and compassion are in very limited supply.

I'll make a comparison.
Should we promote the right attitude towards veganism or just compromise our views if that will get people to make better choices in practice?
I agree with the latter. Which is why I also don't see a problem with achieving some fairness if that will make people feel better, rather than choosing the potentially less efficient way of changing their attitudes towards fairness. Or you can just try out a multi-dimensional approach for both issues.

By the way: I actually do use the word vegan, because the general consensus is that I look like a pretty normal person. Which is a big difference from the image that people usually have of vegans around here: either very hipster- or punk- or hippy-looking. I personally like those types of people, but the average person is suspicious of them and their beliefs. They're usually surprised that veganism is not just an issue of style/sub-culture or ideology, so I think it's good to comunicate that to them from a source that they can relate to better.
Only when it's not counter-productive, of course.

inator wrote: Yes, but if the money is more equally distributed, there wouldn't be such a need for Bill Gates's charity.

No, you should add a "maybe" to that. Because we don't really know. This is yet another thing we'd need evidence for; I was just presenting an alternative theory to egalitarianism that's just as viable.

inator wrote: You always need redistribution, even the major religions take that into consideration.

Well, I wouldn't give that much credibility, but given medieval quality of life, you were dealing more with extreme poverty vs. middle class, and that's where redistribution means more.

inator wrote: Now if you make charitableness highly popular, then super rich people can start competing with each other in this area too for status, rather than just competing for a place on the Forbes list.

That's kind of something they're already doing, although more of that would be great.

inator wrote:But, to reiterate my idea, the question is whether it's not simply better to have a uniform and centralized system of redistribution (including for investments in research, new technology etc.) rather than depending on the personal inclinations of a few individuals. It might be safer that way.

The trouble is that may take away the sense of freedom of choice, and may discourage people from becoming very rich (and the work it takes to get there), thus harm the economy. Taxes do seem to disincentivize earning a little.

inator wrote: That's also a way of looking at it. But I'm curous: Taking an unfertilized egg from a hen that has no interest in the egg. It's morally acceptable, but I wouldn't say it's vegan.

It depends on how you define veganism, and how you do it, and if it's commercial in any way or benefits you (rather than the hen) and what the tendency is (is it prone to abuse and cutting corners, as is most business intent on optimizing profit?).
But to debunk a common misconception: hens are often broody and do have interest in unfertilized eggs (even if it's an irrational one, it's like taking a teddy bear away from a child who thinks the bear is his or her friend).

inator wrote: Does that mean that veganism is inherently deontological? And we're just rational people who's conclusions just happen to overlap with veganism most of the time?

That is arguably where tentative veganism comes in. But again, it depends on how you define veganism. There's a bit of wiggle room, since it refers to harm.

inator wrote: I'd like to see that happen. I'm just afraid that arguing with dogmatic ethics that can lead to good results might be divisive and counter-productive for our goals.

That is a potential concern, but if you look at the march of progress on the internet (and its incredible power to expose and call out bullshit), those dogmatists are more likely an anchor dragging us down.

If this were the pre-internet era, I would be more inclined to agree with you. At this point? I don't see it as realistic that deontology is anything but a handicap for the rational vegan message that has to get out there.

inator wrote: Maybe it's better to just get out the new and better message, without purposely attacking the deontologist one. Just approach the issue on different levels, depending on who your audience is.

I disagree, because we need to show people in the vegan movement WHY this is the better message, and which arguments to make. The deontological message is confusing people.

inator wrote: That can help. It can also help to make them richer. Let's just tackle the problem from more angles.

Why, if one is cheaper and more effective than the other? We have limited resources; we should focus on the best, most practical approaches.
Also: I'm not sure it's inherently good to just make people richer without the education they need to make good use of their new resources.

inator wrote: I'm not sure that's effective for activism,but I think it's great if they can make it happen and they should be allowed to try.

Should they? Because this is a perfect example of something that just causes infighting, and where they won't win that fight. Intersectionalists are famous on the internet for being horribly venomous to non-intersectionalists, and insisting their way is the only way -- without an iota of evidence (and contrary to reason).

Are you familiar with atheism plus, and all of the problems that caused?

By comparison, what I'm doing (attacking deontology) is with strongly reasoned arguments that are VERY effective at overcoming infighting and getting people on the same page: a page that also delivers a less confusing and more durable message which is not defeated by a simple debunking of an inherent logical Achilles' heel.

The growth of dogma and irrationality is something we need to oppose if the vegan messages which are getting out there (with a limited number of voices) are to be effective and not dismissed trivially for the baseless assertions these deontological claims are.

inator wrote: It might not be completely logical, but neither is part of the audience (many liberals who are also dogmatic might respond well to this).

And thus perpetuate the problem.

I've said before, I'm OK with the religious vegan message, as long as it's overtly religious, because it doesn't confuse people as to the rational secular vegan message.
If it's couched in spirituality, that's fine. But if it pretends to be rational, that's a serious problem and will just confuse people who are having a hard enough time as it is getting their message straight.

inator wrote: Experiment with different approaches, as long as they doesn't start conflicting with each other too much. But I haven't seen that to be such big an issue until now.

We do see easier conveyance of information with the dogmatic message, since it's a simple script that doesn't take much to pretend to understand. It's easier to make people susceptible to it go vegan, perhaps. But they don't stay vegan (it takes an intelligent person a few minutes to tear apart the arguments and get them eating meat again), and the argument can't work on the smart people who we most NEED to be vegan and be spreading these messages. We need the skeptical community.

inator wrote: In this particular case, how does taxing tampons as luxuy items help men specifically?

Taxes help everybody, when taxes are on women, it helps men more.

inator wrote: Should we promote the right attitude towards veganism or just compromise our views if that will get people to make better choices in practice?

One is a bit more of a long game. I'd love more research on this (of what I've done, I've seen recidivism being based mainly on bad philosophy or bad diet advice), but the trouble is that deontologists don't respond to data.

Deontology has not been making good progress; they've had the monopoly for decades, and recidivism is still terrible.
While it's not causative, the same kind of irrational thinking (rather than a skeptical science based approach) is also related to the nutritional failures that lead to recidivism. We need the science based skeptics for veganism to succeed, both philosophically and nutritionally.

inator wrote: By the way: I actually do use the word vegan, because the general consensus is that I look like a pretty normal person. Which is a big difference from the image that people usually have of vegans around here: either very hipster- or punk- or hippy-looking. I personally like those types of people, but the average person is suspicious of them and their beliefs. They're usually surprised that veganism is not just an issue of style/sub-culture or ideology, so I think it's good to comunicate that to them from a source that they can relate to better.
Only when it's not counter-productive, of course.

That's a good way to think about it. I also like body builders identifying as vegan, to break misconceptions.

I just mean in terms of asking people do do something: It's easier to ask for what they see as a "middle road", and then they're more likely to buy more later.

brimstoneSalad wrote:No, you should add a "maybe" to that. Because we don't really know. This is yet another thing we'd need evidence for; I was just presenting an alternative theory to egalitarianism that's just as viable.

Yes and I’m not rejecting that idea, just arguing for mine for debating purposes and to get a better grip on my own position. Also because I’m naturally inclined (can’t find a nurture-related cause) to root for the egalitarian approach more. I'm aware I have a slight bias and I’m keeping it contained when it comes to actual conclusion drawing…
Both positions are defensible and the scope of their consequences is very hard to grasp. At this point we need some data and a cost-benefit analysis to decide what’s most effective, the rest just means brainstorming for alternatives. Which doesn’t mean it’s not valuable conversation.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Well, I wouldn't give that much credibility, but given medieval quality of life, you were dealing more with extreme poverty vs. middle class, and that's where redistribution means more.

I meant stuff like the Jizya in the Quran and the Hadiths. The New Testament is less specific on that I think, there are some mentions but I can’t remember where. You can also just derive it from its general message. Not that all this means anything, I just think it’s interesting.

brimstoneSalad wrote:The trouble is that may take away the sense of freedom of choice, and may discourage people from becoming very rich (and the work it takes to get there), thus harm the economy. Taxes do seem to disincentivize earning a little.

Might be, it’s a common concern. I want to see the numbers.
The whole idea behind ‘hard’ capitalism is maximizing competitiveness (and therefore stimulating production and consumption => consumerism). Competition – people comparing themselves to each other, feeling dissatisfied with what they have, and trying to get more. It’s healthy to some degree for overall advancement, but maximizing it at any cost? (possibly at the cost of well-being, and don’t get me started on environmental issues).
If we’re talking first-world countries, I guess it would be best to find some sort of middle ground between (controlled) growth and lower (perception of) inequality. Just the ‘soft’ version. In developing countries I agree that fast economic growth is imperative in order to bring the worst-off above the poverty line. In the end, any specific type of policy that’s well formulated is better than any other type that’s badly formulated for a specific context.

Some much needed data, though just a tiny fragment of it (if you have access to them and time on your hands):
http://cje.oxfordjournals.org/content/32/3/479.abstract
http://cje.oxfordjournals.org/content/39/3/935.abstract
http://cje.oxfordjournals.org/content/39/3/959.abstract
http://epn.sagepub.com/content/46/10/2489.abstract
They’re not one-sided, but my selection is perhaps a bit biased, from lack of time to look at everything - these I’ve just needed before in another context.

brimstoneSalad wrote:It depends on how you define veganism, and how you do it, and if it's commercial in any way or benefits you (rather than the hen) and what the tendency is (is it prone to abuse and cutting corners, as is most business intent on optimizing profit?).
But to debunk a common misconception: hens are often broody and do have interest in unfertilized eggs (even if it's an irrational one, it's like taking a teddy bear away from a child who thinks the bear is his or her friend).

I mean it as an example in a bubble. I know someone with a pet hen and she’s the exception to the rule: she’s absolutely not interested in her eggs, I can confirm she just leaves them lying around and never comes back to them. There’s no moral issue there, though I still wouldn’t eat them because of other concerns.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Also: I'm not sure it's inherently good to just make people richer without the education they need to make good use of their new resources.

That’s like saying: But if you free all the cows, they’ll overtake the earth! They wouldn’t just become millionaires over night, you can barely notice incremental change.
Hell, I could use 10 more euros next year, that’ll buy me 10 pomegranates. But then you’ll tell me I should’ve bought beans….I'll learn for the next year.
Also, being poor and being uneducated often have circular causality.

brimstoneSalad wrote:That is a potential concern, but if you look at the march of progress on the internet (and its incredible power to expose and call out bullshit), those dogmatists are more likely an anchor dragging us down.

If this were the pre-internet era, I would be more inclined to agree with you. At this point? I don't see it as realistic that deontology is anything but a handicap for the rational vegan message that has to get out there.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Why, if one is cheaper and more effective than the other? We have limited resources; we should focus on the best, most practical approaches.

I'm all for calling out bullshit, and you might be right. But you’d have to prove which method is cheaper and more effective. And then after you implement it, see if there’s still room for improvement and if we have resources to dedicate for improving it by other means. And also see if a combination of methods doesn't reinforce the positive effect of both in some multi-level way.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Should they? Because this is a perfect example of something that just causes infighting, and where they won't win that fight. Intersectionalists are famous on the internet for being horribly venomous to non-intersectionalists, and insisting their way is the only way -- without an iota of evidence (and contrary to reason).

Are you familiar with atheism plus, and all of the problems that caused?

By comparison, what I'm doing (attacking deontology) is with strongly reasoned arguments that are VERY effective at overcoming infighting and getting people on the same page: a page that also delivers a less confusing and more durable message which is not defeated by a simple debunking of an inherent logical Achilles' heel.

The growth of dogma and irrationality is something we need to oppose if the vegan messages which are getting out there (with a limited number of voices) are to be effective and not dismissed trivially for the baseless assertions these deontological claims are.

To be honest, I’m clueless about what’s going on most other blogs, forums etc. I was talking from a purely theoretical point of view before. I’ll check that out. I was somehow under the impression that intersectionalists are just background noise right now.

brimstoneSalad wrote:And thus perpetuate the problem.

I've said before, I'm OK with the religious vegan message, as long as it's overtly religious, because it doesn't confuse people as to the rational secular vegan message.
If it's couched in spirituality, that's fine. But if it pretends to be rational, that's a serious problem and will just confuse people who are having a hard enough time as it is getting their message straight.

I see. Usually I think people might just respond well to the shocking emotional message and be converted that way. Only then do they get in contact with the rational message, which stabilizes their position. If they don’t find it, they might have a higher chance of going back to meat-eating.
But at the same time, I’m unconvinced that the purely rational message has the same power to reach most people in the first place. On average, people just seem to react more strongly to being disturbed emotionally, it helps them internalize the message faster.
You can be rational, understand the logic, and still not feel motivated to make the change.

To quote a meat-eater on this forum:

ohokaythen wrote: “Veganism and atheism has a lot in common in a way, hence this forum lol . Its so easy to argue it logically if you just stop and think. It is so much harder to get peoples' "heart" in the right place.

brimstoneSalad wrote:Taxes help everybody, when taxes are on women, it helps men more.

I only mean it as an example of an asymmetrical but non-confrontational issue (there’s no conflict of interests, men have no claim on getting rewarded because women need tampons) that still disadvantages one gender for no good reason.

brimstoneSalad wrote:One is a bit more of a long game. I'd love more research on this (of what I've done, I've seen recidivism being based mainly on bad philosophy or bad diet advice), but the trouble is that deontologists don't respond to data.
Deontology has not been making good progress; they've had the monopoly for decades, and recidivism is still terrible.
While it's not causative, the same kind of irrational thinking (rather than a skeptical science based approach) is also related to the nutritional failures that lead to recidivism. We need the science based skeptics for veganism to succeed, both philosophically and nutritionally.

brimstoneSalad wrote:I disagree, because we need to show people in the vegan movement WHY this is the better message, and which arguments to make. The deontological message is confusing people.

We need both, I think. I'm most interested in finding out how people work and in meeting them where they are. So many people are not just irrational, but also anti-rationalists.... You'd be an intersectionalist if you wanted to promote veganism and rationalism at the same time. Very rational people usually don’t stop at one source of information anyway, they do more research and eventually get to the good stuff.

Whichever works best, I'm down with. But there's much to consider here, including recidivism, which makes understanding the consequences of each method and how they interact with each other more difficult.

brimstoneSalad wrote:I just mean in terms of asking people do do something: It's easier to ask for what they see as a "middle road", and then they're more likely to buy more later.

Yeah, I’ve had more success getting the message across to someone that way too. Just for the initial steps, when resistance is higher.

inator wrote: Both positions are defensible and the scope of their consequences is very hard to grasp. At this point we need some data and a cost-benefit analysis to decide what’s most effective, the rest just means brainstorming for alternatives. Which doesn’t mean it’s not valuable conversation.

Right. I just reject the idea that they're the same thing, because they won't always be. I'm open to egalitarian/justice ideas if they have more beneficial consequences and it can be shown that this is true.

inator wrote: Might be, it’s a common concern. I want to see the numbers.

Right, I'm certainly not an ideological libertarian/capitalist in any sense. Europe works pretty well, and you have a good point about environmental consequences of one-upmanship (which is why we so desperately need carbon taxes, so competition can help resolve that issue too).

inator wrote:

brimstoneSalad wrote:Also: I'm not sure it's inherently good to just make people richer without the education they need to make good use of their new resources.

That’s like saying: But if you free all the cows, they’ll overtake the earth! They wouldn’t just become millionaires over night, you can barely notice incremental change.

I don't think so.
I prefer to focus on education, which will result in them learning how to become better off.
As you said: "being poor and being uneducated often have circular causality."

inator wrote: Hell, I could use 10 more euros next year, that’ll buy me 10 pomegranates. But then you’ll tell me I should’ve bought beans….I'll learn for the next year.

Don't forget the environmental concerns you brought up in the other point. It's common for developing countries to be incredibly wasteful in terms of resources (and consume a lot of meat), with more developed ones plateauing and reducing consumption with social responsibility and better information about health and human happiness.
If we had infinite resources and time, and there wasn't serious environmental destruction and animal cruelty involved I might agree with you, but as it stands we can't necessarily afford that waste/growing pain.

inator wrote: I'm all for calling out bullshit, and you might be right. But you’d have to prove which method is cheaper and more effective. And then after you implement it, see if there’s still room for improvement and if we have resources to dedicate for improving it by other means. And also see if a combination of methods doesn't reinforce the positive effect of both in some multi-level way.

There's definitely a lot of research to be done on this. I'm mainly going by extensive personal experience at this point, in starting with people with deontological misconceptions and convincing them veganism is rational based on consequentialism. However, I also have a biased sample size in rational people who will be inclined to prefer the arguments I'm offering.

inator wrote: I see. Usually I think people might just respond well to the shocking emotional message and be converted that way. Only then do they get in contact with the rational message, which stabilizes their position.

I'm fine with the shocking emotional message too. I'm just saying the rational message that follows needs to be consistent and actually rational. The only thing I'm actively fighting is the falsely secular deontological message.

inator wrote: I only mean it as an example of an asymmetrical but non-confrontational issue (there’s no conflict of interests, men have no claim on getting rewarded because women need tampons) that still disadvantages one gender for no good reason.

Not sure what you mean. Do you think inequality is based on notions of entitlement? What is entitlement based on?

inator wrote: We need both, I think. I'm most interested in finding out how people work and in meeting them where they are. So many people are not just irrational, but also anti-rationalists.... You'd be an intersectionalist if you wanted to promote veganism and rationalism at the same time.

This is why I don't oppose the overtly religious and spiritual vegan messages. The religious nature is apparent to any observer, and it won't confuse people as much.

inator wrote: Very rational people usually don’t stop at one source of information anyway, they do more research and eventually get to the good stuff.

Unfortunately, when they want to continue eating meat, they do. They'll be quite satisfied (as many theists are) with encountering a bad argument and leaving it at that.

You're asking for a standard of rationality, in challenging beliefs and looking at personal biases, that is profoundly rare in this world. People aren't going to put in an exceptionally large amount of work to dig around for a good argument when they wanted a bad argument anyway.
Deontological arguments are giving otherwise mostly rational people and excuse to decide veganism as a whole is irrational and keep eating meat.

Now, if the arguments were overtly spiritual, they'd be better able to understand, "OK, this is a Christian argument for veganism, but I'm not Christian so this one's not for me, but I know not all vegans are Christian so I should probably find an Atheist argument for it if there is one".
They might not do that, but at least there's a better chance of it.

My experience has been that people are wildly misinformed about the rational arguments for veganism, and it is because they have encountered the dumb but easily repeatable deontological arguments.

inator wrote: Whichever works best, I'm down with. But there's much to consider here, including recidivism, which makes understanding the consequences of each method and how they interact with each other more difficult.

Deontological arguments may have a slight advantage in conveyance (they're dumb arguments, and easy to explain and propagate, but only may, because they're also very extreme all or nothing kind of arguments), but reducing recidivism is always going to be more achievable with a consequential argument, since it's rational and can't be easily dismantled by a simple argument from a modestly intelligent carnist, and non-arbitrary so it's not easy to replace at whim by swapping out the deontological premises.

I'd love to do more research on it to explore the effects of these arguments on the general non-rational public.

As far as the internet goes, and the rational proponents we need on our side leading the flock, consequentialism is a clear winner in all respects.

Don’t let your dreams become animals’ nightmares. People who care about animals should support reforms and not limit themselves to “empty cages, not bigger cages” rhetoric. Here is why: https://medium.com/@TheAnimalist/dont-let-your-dreams-become-animals-nightmares-3afe2bf8fbfc#.praqcskeb

Francione is the F word of animal activism: https://medium.com/@TheAnimalist/ok-then-francione-464b7bb22f74#.tyca4ccoo

@brimstoneSalad, will you explain what you think is wrong with the categorical imperative?

Cirion Spellbinder wrote: ↑Sun Apr 29, 2018 12:24 am @brimstoneSalad, will you explain what you think is wrong with the categorical imperative?

https://www.coursera.org/learn/altruism ... bjectivism