You can slightly change the scenarios and get it so that people counter factually wouldn’t have died if you didn’t exist, which don’t seem much morally different. For example X is going to donate to givewell and save Zs life. Should you (Y) convince X to donate to an anti-tobacco campaign which will save more lives. Is this morally the same as (risk free, escalation-less) terrorism or the same as being X?
Anyway I have the feeling people are getting bored of me on this subject, including myself. Simply chalk this up to someone not compartmentalizing correctly. Although I think that if I need to keep consequentialist reasoning compartmentalised, I am likely to find all consequentialist reasoning more suspect.
You can slightly change the scenarios and get it so that people counter factually wouldn’t have died if you didn’t exist, which don’t seem much morally different. For example X is going to donate to givewell and save Zs life. Should you (Y) convince X to donate to an anti-tobacco campaign which will save more lives. Is this morally the same as (risk free, escalation-less) terrorism or the same as being X?
Anyway I have the feeling people are getting bored of me on this subject, including myself. Simply chalk this up to someone not compartmentalizing correctly. Although I think that if I need to keep consequentialist reasoning compartmentalised, I am likely to find all consequentialist reasoning more suspect.