Yes, but my question is conditional. Assume that you already sincerely believe in conscientious objection, in the sense of personal ideology such that you could describe it to a draft board. Now that we’re conditioning on that, and we assume already that your primary goal is to avoid causing harm or death… then further ask what behaviors might be best to generate the kinds of signals that will work to convince a draft board. Merely having actual pacifist beliefs is not enough. Someone could have those beliefs but then do actions that poorly communicate them to a draft board. Someone else could have those beliefs and do behaviors that more successfully communicate them to draft boards. And to whatever extent there are behaviors outside of the scope of just giving an account of one’s ideology I am asking to analyze the effectiveness.
I really think my question is pretty simple. Assume your goal is genuine pacifism but that you’re worried this won’t convince a draft board. What should you do? Is donation a good idea? Yes, these could be questions a faker would ask. So what? They could also be questions a sincere person would ask, and I don’t see any reason for all the downvoting or questions about signal faking. Why not just do the thought experiment where you assume that you are first a sincere conscientious objector and second a person concerned about draft board odds?
If there’s a draft and conscientious objection is an exemption, then there will be information available about how to present yourself. Keeping track of such information should be part of your strategy.
This being said, a record of giving money to pacifist causes doesn’t seem like it can make things worse (unless the government decides that some pacifist organizations are supporting terrorism) and might help.
I’m asking about how to efficiently signal actual pacifism.
And the best way to do that is:
Replace “serious injury or death” with “causing serious injury or death”.
Still true conditioning on what you said. It remains true regardless of whether you’re faking or not. That’s why I didn’t mention sincerity at all.
Based on my priors, if the draft board functions in a similar manner to typical american public boards and committees, then the general feeling and impression that the members of the board “get” of you will be 90% of the decision, assuming you have no record of violence and no obvious thing signalling that you don’t actually believe in pacifism. The stronger their feeling(s), the more their mind will rationalize towards perceiving you as the kind of person you want them to perceive you as.
Thus, using a bit of Dark Arts by signalling first and foremost that you care only about minimizing violence throughout the world in all situations is an effective way to get their impression of you to reflect your actual views (given the assumptions).
It is not the only way, and it might not be sufficient on its own, but just that alone is enough to get me a job from an interview despite massive deficiencies in my resume over some other applicant who is clearly perfectly qualified and has exactly what they ask for.
Assume that you already sincerely believe in conscientious objection, in the sense of personal ideology such that you could describe it to a draft board.
It would probably help to explicitly state this in the original post.
Yes, but my question is conditional. Assume that you already sincerely believe in conscientious objection, in the sense of personal ideology such that you could describe it to a draft board. Now that we’re conditioning on that, and we assume already that your primary goal is to avoid causing harm or death… then further ask what behaviors might be best to generate the kinds of signals that will work to convince a draft board. Merely having actual pacifist beliefs is not enough. Someone could have those beliefs but then do actions that poorly communicate them to a draft board. Someone else could have those beliefs and do behaviors that more successfully communicate them to draft boards. And to whatever extent there are behaviors outside of the scope of just giving an account of one’s ideology I am asking to analyze the effectiveness.
I really think my question is pretty simple. Assume your goal is genuine pacifism but that you’re worried this won’t convince a draft board. What should you do? Is donation a good idea? Yes, these could be questions a faker would ask. So what? They could also be questions a sincere person would ask, and I don’t see any reason for all the downvoting or questions about signal faking. Why not just do the thought experiment where you assume that you are first a sincere conscientious objector and second a person concerned about draft board odds?
If there’s a draft and conscientious objection is an exemption, then there will be information available about how to present yourself. Keeping track of such information should be part of your strategy.
This being said, a record of giving money to pacifist causes doesn’t seem like it can make things worse (unless the government decides that some pacifist organizations are supporting terrorism) and might help.
Still true conditioning on what you said. It remains true regardless of whether you’re faking or not. That’s why I didn’t mention sincerity at all.
Based on my priors, if the draft board functions in a similar manner to typical american public boards and committees, then the general feeling and impression that the members of the board “get” of you will be 90% of the decision, assuming you have no record of violence and no obvious thing signalling that you don’t actually believe in pacifism. The stronger their feeling(s), the more their mind will rationalize towards perceiving you as the kind of person you want them to perceive you as.
Thus, using a bit of Dark Arts by signalling first and foremost that you care only about minimizing violence throughout the world in all situations is an effective way to get their impression of you to reflect your actual views (given the assumptions).
It is not the only way, and it might not be sufficient on its own, but just that alone is enough to get me a job from an interview despite massive deficiencies in my resume over some other applicant who is clearly perfectly qualified and has exactly what they ask for.
It would probably help to explicitly state this in the original post.