Indeed, it may turn out to be the case that we can dissolve the debate between deontological intuitions and utilitarian intuitions if we can map the cognitive algorithms that produce them.
Suppose it’s an empirical fact that when people engage in consequentialist-type cognition, they typically use a model of the world that is ontologically crazy (for example, one with irreducible mental entities). Would that be an argument against consequentialism in general? In one sense it is, since it means that we can’t straightforwardly translate naive consequentialism into a correct moral philosophy, so the consequentialist approach to moral philosophy is at least more difficult than it might first appear. But surely this empirical fact would not “dissolve” the debate with the conclusion that no form of consequentialism can be right, and therefore the whole approach should be abandoned.
Similarly, I suggest that empirical facts about how people typically form deontological moral judgements can’t dissolve the debate between consequentialism vs deontology. A deontologist could still claim, for example, that while the typical deontological rules people naively come up with to explain their intuitive emotional judgements are not very good, intuitive emotional judgements are still the only source of “morality” that we have, and some set of more sophisticated deontological rules fits those intuitions better than any other moral philosophy, including any form of consequentialism.
ETA: Perhaps it would make more sense is to say that the specific deontological intuitions that people tend to naively hold (such as “lying is always wrong”) can be dissolved with more scientific self-knowledge. On the other hand, it seems plausible that many of our consequentalist-type “values” can also be dissolved the same way. (See my previous comment.)
Like Eliezer, I see solving the question (or proving that it’s a bad question) as a separate project from ‘dissolving the question’ by uncovering the cognitive algorithms that generate the question in the first place.
surely this empirical fact would not “dissolve” the debate with the conclusion that no form of consequentialism can be right, and therefore the whole approach should be abandoned.
No, but it shouldn’t expect to arrive at correct results by engaging in human consequentialist reasoning. Perhaps we’d need to use therapy or drugs or neuroscientific tools to fix our brains so they can do consequentialist thinking without craziness, or else we’d have computers do our consequentialist thinking for us.
A deontologist could still claim, for example, that while the typical deontological rules people naively come up with to explain their intuitive emotional judgements are not very good, intuitive emotional judgements are still the only source of “morality” that we have, and some set of more sophisticated deontological rules fits those intuitions better than any other moral philosophy, including any form of consequentialism.
Yes. If deontology is to be fully killed off, one must pair a ‘refutation of a mistake’ with a ‘dissolution to algorithm’ that explains how we could have made the mistake in the first place. The present post only suggests the second part.
Like Eliezer, I see solving the question (or proving that it’s a bad question) as a separate project from ‘dissolving the question’ by uncovering the cognitive algorithms that generate the question in the first place.
At the end, I hope, there was no question left—not even the feeling of a question.
Semantics aside, would you say that we can, now or in the foreseeable future, kill off deontology so completely that there is “no question left” (even if that’s not the goal of this post)?
Hmmm. I’m not sure. It may depend on how our cognitive algorithms work, and I haven’t decoded them yet.
Do you expect they can ever be “decoded”? After all, we can only form high-level understanding of what’s going on, while what’s really going on includes all the unsummarizeable details that no human can comprehend. There are no simple laws underlying all of human moral cognition, the way it actually works.
Suppose it’s an empirical fact that when people engage in consequentialist-type cognition, they typically use a model of the world that is ontologically crazy (for example, one with irreducible mental entities). Would that be an argument against consequentialism in general? In one sense it is, since it means that we can’t straightforwardly translate naive consequentialism into a correct moral philosophy, so the consequentialist approach to moral philosophy is at least more difficult than it might first appear. But surely this empirical fact would not “dissolve” the debate with the conclusion that no form of consequentialism can be right, and therefore the whole approach should be abandoned.
Similarly, I suggest that empirical facts about how people typically form deontological moral judgements can’t dissolve the debate between consequentialism vs deontology. A deontologist could still claim, for example, that while the typical deontological rules people naively come up with to explain their intuitive emotional judgements are not very good, intuitive emotional judgements are still the only source of “morality” that we have, and some set of more sophisticated deontological rules fits those intuitions better than any other moral philosophy, including any form of consequentialism.
ETA: Perhaps it would make more sense is to say that the specific deontological intuitions that people tend to naively hold (such as “lying is always wrong”) can be dissolved with more scientific self-knowledge. On the other hand, it seems plausible that many of our consequentalist-type “values” can also be dissolved the same way. (See my previous comment.)
Like Eliezer, I see solving the question (or proving that it’s a bad question) as a separate project from ‘dissolving the question’ by uncovering the cognitive algorithms that generate the question in the first place.
No, but it shouldn’t expect to arrive at correct results by engaging in human consequentialist reasoning. Perhaps we’d need to use therapy or drugs or neuroscientific tools to fix our brains so they can do consequentialist thinking without craziness, or else we’d have computers do our consequentialist thinking for us.
Yes. If deontology is to be fully killed off, one must pair a ‘refutation of a mistake’ with a ‘dissolution to algorithm’ that explains how we could have made the mistake in the first place. The present post only suggests the second part.
I thought “dissolving the question” meant:
Semantics aside, would you say that we can, now or in the foreseeable future, kill off deontology so completely that there is “no question left” (even if that’s not the goal of this post)?
Hmmm. I’m not sure. It may depend on how our cognitive algorithms work, and I haven’t decoded them yet. Do you have an intuition on the matter?
Do you expect they can ever be “decoded”? After all, we can only form high-level understanding of what’s going on, while what’s really going on includes all the unsummarizeable details that no human can comprehend. There are no simple laws underlying all of human moral cognition, the way it actually works.