If you follow a law that is grossly unjust because it’s a law, or follow a social convention that is grossly unjust because it is a social convention, you would be actively choosing to contribute to that injustice. Sticking out your neck & going against the grain based on your best judgment is (I thought) a kind of rationalist virtue.
Sticking out your neck is only a virtue if it ends up giving you greater expected utility than following the social norm. Sticking out your neck because you like the idea of yourself as some sort of justice warrior and ruining your entire life for it is the non-rationalist loser’s choice.
The point of Johns story is that both Red and Judge are better off working together than they would be if they fought, even though they strongly disagree on the scissor statement. Fighting would in effect be defecting even when the payoff from defection is lower than the payoff from cooperation. This is basically how all of society operates on a daily basis. It’s virtually impossible to only cooperate with people who share your exact values unless you choose to live in poverty working for some sort of cult or ineffective commune.
What makes Judge and Red special is that they have a very advanced ability to favor cooperation even when they have a strong emotional gut reaction to defect. And their ability is much greater than that of the general populace who could get along with people just fine over minor disagreements, but couldn’t handle disagreeing over the scissor statement.
I think you’re confusing rationality for plain self-interest. If you have something to protect, then it may be reasonable to sacrifice personal comfort or even your life to protect it.
Also, you comment implies that the only reason you’d fight for something other than yourself is out of “liking the idea of yourself as some sort of social justice warrior,” as opposed to caring about something and believing you can win by applying some strategy. And saying you’d “ruin your life” implies a set of values by which a life would count as “ruined.”
I think it can be both, but I don’t have the sense that something being a scissors statement means that one should automatically ignore the scissors statement and strike solely at the person making the statement. Scissors statement or not, if a law is grossly unjust, then resist it.
Scissor statements reveal pre-existing differences in values, they don’t create them. There really are people out there who have values that result in them doing terrible things.
It’s one thing when you make that choice for yourself. This is about a disagreement so heinous that you can’t countenance others living according to a different belief than your own. I read JMH as arguing for a humility that sometimes looks like deferring to the social norm, so that you don’t risk forcing your own (possibly wrong) view on others. I suspect they’d still want to live their life according to their best (flawed) judgment… just with an ever-present awareness that they are almost certainly wrong about some of it, and possibly wrong in monstrous ways.
This is about a disagreement so heinous that you can’t countenance others living according to a different belief than your own.
Beliefs and values aren’t just clothes we wear—we act on them, and live by them. (And don’t confuse me for talking about what people say their values are, vs what they act on. Someone can say they value “liberation for all,” for example, but in practice they behave in accordance with the value “might makes right.” Even if someone feels bad about it, if that’s what they’re acting out, over and over again, then that’s their revealed preference. In my model, what people do in practice & their intent are what is worth tracking.) So it’s reasonable to assume that if someone has a particularly heinous belief, and particularly heinous values, that they act on those beliefs and values.
I read JMH as arguing for a humility that sometimes looks like deferring to the social norm
Why should that particular humility be privileged? In choosing to privilege deference to a social norm or humility over $heinous_thing, one is saying that a {sense of humility|social norm} is more important than the $heinous_thing, and that is a value judgment.
I suspect they’d still want to live their life according to their best (flawed) judgment… just with an ever-present awareness that they are almost certainly wrong about some of it, and possibly wrong in monstrous ways.
If you think your judgment is wrong, you always have the option to learn more and get better judgment. Being so afraid of being wrong that a person will refuse to act is a kind of trap, and I don’t think people are acting that way in the rest of their lives. If you’re wiring an electrical system for your house, and you have an ever-present awareness that you’re almost certainly wrong about some of it, you’re not going to keep doing what you’re doing. You’ll crack open a text book, because dying of electrocution or setting your house on fire is an especially bad outcome, and one you sincerely care about not happening to you. Likewise, if you care about some moral value, if it feels real to you, then you’ll act on it.
If you follow a law that is grossly unjust because it’s a law, or follow a social convention that is grossly unjust because it is a social convention, you would be actively choosing to contribute to that injustice. Sticking out your neck & going against the grain based on your best judgment is (I thought) a kind of rationalist virtue.
Sticking out your neck is only a virtue if it ends up giving you greater expected utility than following the social norm. Sticking out your neck because you like the idea of yourself as some sort of justice warrior and ruining your entire life for it is the non-rationalist loser’s choice.
The point of Johns story is that both Red and Judge are better off working together than they would be if they fought, even though they strongly disagree on the scissor statement. Fighting would in effect be defecting even when the payoff from defection is lower than the payoff from cooperation. This is basically how all of society operates on a daily basis. It’s virtually impossible to only cooperate with people who share your exact values unless you choose to live in poverty working for some sort of cult or ineffective commune.
What makes Judge and Red special is that they have a very advanced ability to favor cooperation even when they have a strong emotional gut reaction to defect. And their ability is much greater than that of the general populace who could get along with people just fine over minor disagreements, but couldn’t handle disagreeing over the scissor statement.
I think you’re confusing rationality for plain self-interest. If you have something to protect, then it may be reasonable to sacrifice personal comfort or even your life to protect it.
Also, you comment implies that the only reason you’d fight for something other than yourself is out of “liking the idea of yourself as some sort of social justice warrior,” as opposed to caring about something and believing you can win by applying some strategy. And saying you’d “ruin your life” implies a set of values by which a life would count as “ruined.”
Seems like you’re rejecting the idea that a “grossly unjust” law could be a scissors statement?
I think it can be both, but I don’t have the sense that something being a scissors statement means that one should automatically ignore the scissors statement and strike solely at the person making the statement. Scissors statement or not, if a law is grossly unjust, then resist it.
Scissor statements reveal pre-existing differences in values, they don’t create them. There really are people out there who have values that result in them doing terrible things.
It’s one thing when you make that choice for yourself. This is about a disagreement so heinous that you can’t countenance others living according to a different belief than your own. I read JMH as arguing for a humility that sometimes looks like deferring to the social norm, so that you don’t risk forcing your own (possibly wrong) view on others. I suspect they’d still want to live their life according to their best (flawed) judgment… just with an ever-present awareness that they are almost certainly wrong about some of it, and possibly wrong in monstrous ways.
Beliefs and values aren’t just clothes we wear—we act on them, and live by them. (And don’t confuse me for talking about what people say their values are, vs what they act on. Someone can say they value “liberation for all,” for example, but in practice they behave in accordance with the value “might makes right.” Even if someone feels bad about it, if that’s what they’re acting out, over and over again, then that’s their revealed preference. In my model, what people do in practice & their intent are what is worth tracking.) So it’s reasonable to assume that if someone has a particularly heinous belief, and particularly heinous values, that they act on those beliefs and values.
Why should that particular humility be privileged? In choosing to privilege deference to a social norm or humility over $heinous_thing, one is saying that a {sense of humility|social norm} is more important than the $heinous_thing, and that is a value judgment.
If you think your judgment is wrong, you always have the option to learn more and get better judgment. Being so afraid of being wrong that a person will refuse to act is a kind of trap, and I don’t think people are acting that way in the rest of their lives. If you’re wiring an electrical system for your house, and you have an ever-present awareness that you’re almost certainly wrong about some of it, you’re not going to keep doing what you’re doing. You’ll crack open a text book, because dying of electrocution or setting your house on fire is an especially bad outcome, and one you sincerely care about not happening to you. Likewise, if you care about some moral value, if it feels real to you, then you’ll act on it.
In order to argue for humility, one would have to give the “scissors statement”.
Have you read the fictional sequences?