One obvious problem with trying to overcome bias by means of “self-skepticism” is that many of the biases we try to overcome also shape our skeptical attitudes. Here, as elsewhere, adopting the outside view is probably more effective than attempting to find flaws in one’s thinking “from the inside”.
A possible application for the case at hand is this. Consider the reasons why you chose to work on a particular cause, instead of the many other causes you could have worked for. Are these reasons still the same ones that you currently regard as valid? If not, you should increase your credence in the hypothesis that you might be working on the wrong cause, relative to your present beliefs and values, since you might have reached this view as a result of motivated cognition.
I will give an example from my own personal life. I chose to become a vegetarian many years ago, out of concern for the animals that were suffering (in expectation) as a result of my dietary choices. However, as I read and reflected more on the issue, I came to realize that the indirect effects on other sentient beings where much more relevant than the direct effects on the animals themselves. In particular, I thought that the effects of spreading concern for all sentience by abstaining from eating animals might shape the choices made by our descendants with power to create astronomical amounts of suffering in the Universe. However, this should make me suspicious. Was I really lucky that my new reasons just so happen to vindicate the diet to which my old reasons had caused me to become deeply attached? Or is this instead the result of motivated cognition on my part? I am still a vegetarian, but for arguments of this sort I am less convinced that this is what morality requires of me.
Good post.
One obvious problem with trying to overcome bias by means of “self-skepticism” is that many of the biases we try to overcome also shape our skeptical attitudes. Here, as elsewhere, adopting the outside view is probably more effective than attempting to find flaws in one’s thinking “from the inside”.
A possible application for the case at hand is this. Consider the reasons why you chose to work on a particular cause, instead of the many other causes you could have worked for. Are these reasons still the same ones that you currently regard as valid? If not, you should increase your credence in the hypothesis that you might be working on the wrong cause, relative to your present beliefs and values, since you might have reached this view as a result of motivated cognition.
I will give an example from my own personal life. I chose to become a vegetarian many years ago, out of concern for the animals that were suffering (in expectation) as a result of my dietary choices. However, as I read and reflected more on the issue, I came to realize that the indirect effects on other sentient beings where much more relevant than the direct effects on the animals themselves. In particular, I thought that the effects of spreading concern for all sentience by abstaining from eating animals might shape the choices made by our descendants with power to create astronomical amounts of suffering in the Universe. However, this should make me suspicious. Was I really lucky that my new reasons just so happen to vindicate the diet to which my old reasons had caused me to become deeply attached? Or is this instead the result of motivated cognition on my part? I am still a vegetarian, but for arguments of this sort I am less convinced that this is what morality requires of me.