I agree with and appreciate the broad point. I’ll pick on one detail because I think it matters.
this whole parable of the drowning child, was set to crush down the selfish part of you, to make it look like you would be invalid and shameful and harmful-to-others if the selfish part of you won [...]
It is a parable calculated to set at odds two pieces of yourself… arranging for one of them to hammer down the other in a way that would leave it feeling small and injured and unable to speak in its own defense.
This seems uncharitable? Singer’s thought experiment may have had the above effects, but my impression’s been that it was calculated largely to help people recognize our impartially altruistic parts—parts of us that in practice seem to get hammered down, obliterated, and forgotten far more often than our self-focused parts (consider e.g. how many people do approximately nothing for strangers vs. how many people do approximately nothing for themselves).
So part of me worries that “the drowning child thought experiment is a calculated assault on your personal integrity!” is not just mistaken but yet another hammer by which people will kick down their own altruistic parts—the parts of us that protect those who are small and injured and unable to speak in their own defense.
I think, separately, I would endorse some of the message, though I cannot say what Singer’s intentions were or were not.
Any thought experiment which reveals a conflict in your values and asks you to resolve it without also offering you guidance on how to integrate all your values is going to sacrifice one of your values. This isn’t a novel insight I think, as I’m almost pulling a ‘by definition’ on you, but the spectrum of magnitudes of this is important to me.
Our social network roundabout these parts has many metaphorical skeletons representing dozens and dozens of folks turning themselves into hollowed out “goodness” maximizers after being caught between thought experiment after thought experiment. Again, I don’t attribute malice on the part of the person offering the parable, but Drowning Child is one thing I have seen cut down many people’s sense of self, and I am happy standing loosely against the way it is used in practice on Earth regardless of its original intention.
I agree with and appreciate the broad point. I’ll pick on one detail because I think it matters.
This seems uncharitable? Singer’s thought experiment may have had the above effects, but my impression’s been that it was calculated largely to help people recognize our impartially altruistic parts—parts of us that in practice seem to get hammered down, obliterated, and forgotten far more often than our self-focused parts (consider e.g. how many people do approximately nothing for strangers vs. how many people do approximately nothing for themselves).
So part of me worries that “the drowning child thought experiment is a calculated assault on your personal integrity!” is not just mistaken but yet another hammer by which people will kick down their own altruistic parts—the parts of us that protect those who are small and injured and unable to speak in their own defense.
Peter Singer and Keltham live in different worlds; someone else devised the story there.
Yeah ok. But this essay was posted on Earth. And on Earth I read it as response to a percieved failure-mode of an Effective Altruism philosophy.
I think, separately, I would endorse some of the message, though I cannot say what Singer’s intentions were or were not.
Any thought experiment which reveals a conflict in your values and asks you to resolve it without also offering you guidance on how to integrate all your values is going to sacrifice one of your values. This isn’t a novel insight I think, as I’m almost pulling a ‘by definition’ on you, but the spectrum of magnitudes of this is important to me.
Our social network roundabout these parts has many metaphorical skeletons representing dozens and dozens of folks turning themselves into hollowed out “goodness” maximizers after being caught between thought experiment after thought experiment. Again, I don’t attribute malice on the part of the person offering the parable, but Drowning Child is one thing I have seen cut down many people’s sense of self, and I am happy standing loosely against the way it is used in practice on Earth regardless of its original intention.