I’ll end with this thought: I think you can probably use these ideas of moral weights and moral mountains to quantify how altruistic someone is.
Maybe “altruistic” isn’t the right word. Someone who spends every weekend volunteering at the local homeless shelter out of a duty to help the needy in their community but doesn’t feel any specific obligation towards the poor in other areas is certainly very altruistic. The amount that one does to help those in their circle of consideration seems to be a better fit for most uses of the word altruism.
I dunno. I feel a little uncertain here about whether “altruistic” is the right word. Good point.
My current thinking: there are two distinct concepts.
The moral weights you assign. What your “moral mountain” looks like.
The actions you take. Do you donate 10% of your income? Volunteer at homeless shelters?
To illustrate the difference, consider someone who has a crowded moral mountain, but doesn’t actually take altruistic actions. At first glance this might seem inconsistent or contradictory. But I think there could be various legitimate reasons for this.
One possibility is simply akrasia.
Another is if they don’t have a lot of “moral luck”. For example, I personally am pretty privileged and stuff so it wouldn’t be very costly for me to volunteer at a homeless shelter. But for someone who works two jobs and has kids, it’d be much more costly. And so we could each assign the exact same moral weights but take very different actions.
The shape of the mountain. For example, Longtermist Lauren might not donate any money or help her friends move, but she takes part in various “swing for the fences” types of projects that will almost certainly fail, but if they succeed they’d have an enormous impact on the world and it’s future.
All of that said, (1) feels like a better fit for the term “altruistic” than (2). And really, (2) doesn’t feel to me like it should be incorporated at all. But I’m not really sure.
Maybe “altruistic” isn’t the right word. Someone who spends every weekend volunteering at the local homeless shelter out of a duty to help the needy in their community but doesn’t feel any specific obligation towards the poor in other areas is certainly very altruistic. The amount that one does to help those in their circle of consideration seems to be a better fit for most uses of the word altruism.
How about “morally inclusive”?
I dunno. I feel a little uncertain here about whether “altruistic” is the right word. Good point.
My current thinking: there are two distinct concepts.
The moral weights you assign. What your “moral mountain” looks like.
The actions you take. Do you donate 10% of your income? Volunteer at homeless shelters?
To illustrate the difference, consider someone who has a crowded moral mountain, but doesn’t actually take altruistic actions. At first glance this might seem inconsistent or contradictory. But I think there could be various legitimate reasons for this.
One possibility is simply akrasia.
Another is if they don’t have a lot of “moral luck”. For example, I personally am pretty privileged and stuff so it wouldn’t be very costly for me to volunteer at a homeless shelter. But for someone who works two jobs and has kids, it’d be much more costly. And so we could each assign the exact same moral weights but take very different actions.
The shape of the mountain. For example, Longtermist Lauren might not donate any money or help her friends move, but she takes part in various “swing for the fences” types of projects that will almost certainly fail, but if they succeed they’d have an enormous impact on the world and it’s future.
All of that said, (1) feels like a better fit for the term “altruistic” than (2). And really, (2) doesn’t feel to me like it should be incorporated at all. But I’m not really sure.