almost all of us have plenty of room to increase our ‘moral budget’ by shifting some resources away from self-interest and toward doing good by others.
Except people who are obsessed with having the most impact they can, which describes a lot of people in effective altruism.
I don’t understand the relevance of your second bullet point.
I agree with the third bullet point, but this only works in particular situations where you get synergies. (E.g., a lot of people who go vegan also use the opportunity to become healthier, and that can work well. However, if you’re already a health nut before veganism, you’d find that veganism limits your options and it would get harder to follow the best health advice.)
If I can convince myself that e.g. my work is so important that I morally ought to do (almost) whatever is necessary to optimise my personal productivity, then I can escape from having to experience any internal conflict or guilt over taking ‘selfish’ actions.
This sort of argument can be levelled against anything related to doing slightly weird things due to opportunity costs. It isn’t always right.
I also feel like the argument goes both ways. If you can convince yourself that you’re really moral every time you eat food without animal products, maybe you become more complacent in other ways or rationalize that people who optimize for doing good via workaholicism and cutting down on all non-essential areas of life must all be deluding themselves.
Except people who are obsessed with having the most impact they can, which describes a lot of people in effective altruism.
I don’t understand the relevance of your second bullet point.
I agree with the third bullet point, but this only works in particular situations where you get synergies. (E.g., a lot of people who go vegan also use the opportunity to become healthier, and that can work well. However, if you’re already a health nut before veganism, you’d find that veganism limits your options and it would get harder to follow the best health advice.)
This sort of argument can be levelled against anything related to doing slightly weird things due to opportunity costs. It isn’t always right.
I also feel like the argument goes both ways. If you can convince yourself that you’re really moral every time you eat food without animal products, maybe you become more complacent in other ways or rationalize that people who optimize for doing good via workaholicism and cutting down on all non-essential areas of life must all be deluding themselves.