Is there a particular practical upshot, or an example that you were thinking of? I think the principle of “maximize expected utility, rather than assume the most probable outcome” is pretty mainstream already around here.
The “including verbal behavior” bit in the summary was really what I had in mind. I think that while we may act according to expected utility, we rarely remember to speak according to expected utility, and this is especially significant around sensitive topics where being careless with words can cause harm.
Trouble is, people tend to behave like real-life Nozick’s utility monsters when it comes to the disutility they profess to suffer from speech that offends their sensibilities. I am not a utilitarian, but even if I were, I don’t see how I could ever bring myself to speak (or rather keep quiet) according to expected utility.
(This is a statement about people in general, not meant as a jab at any concrete persons here.)
Utilitarians should take into account all consequences, including the cost of creating incentives to become utility monsters.
I think there’s probably an imbalance between the amount of effort people are expected to expend in not being offensive vs the amount of effort people are expected to expend in not being offended. I’m not sure where it comes from.
Utilitarians should take into account all consequences, including the cost of creating incentives to become utility monsters.
The practical impossibility of taking into account such game-theoretical considerations and other important indirect effects of decisions is one of the (less important) reasons why I see little to no worth in utilitarianism.
You can choose whether to nurse your offense or not nurse it, and you can choose whether to suggest to others that they should be offended. Reactions that are involuntary in the moment itself are sometimes voluntary in the longer run.
Taking offense is a tactic in politics and social interaction however as in ‘the politics of offense’. People will tend to use the tactic more when it appears to be successful.
Get a group of friends where you constantly make (facetious) offensive remarks at one another’s expense, both about individual qualities and group identifications. Eventually, having been called a filthy whatever-ethnicity or a loathsome whatever-sexual-orientation (including loathsome heterosexual, hey why not?) or a Christ-killer or a baby-eating atheist so many times, the emotional impact of such statements will be dulled, which will improve your ability to understand your actual objections and react usefully when you hear people seriously say such things. Worked for me!
I think it’s possible to work towards not being offended by such things as remembering the times when one was accidentally offensive, by checking on whether one’s standards are reasonable, and by evaluating actual risks of what the offensive thing might indicate.
That doesn’t mean one can or should run one’s offendedness down to zero, but (depending one where you’re starting), it’s possible to town it down.
Speech is hella hard to be rational about because the penalty for inaction when speaking in groups is high—if you value having a chance to speak, and if your group isn’t using a formal scheduling algorithm to give all would-be speakers their time slice. You can end up entirely excluded from the conversation just for hesitating. Therefore in most circumstances people speak “from cache”, so it seems to me.
Ever hung out with a group of friends who used a talking stick or similar token? If so, was the average quality of conversation much higher than with other groups of similar size and median IQ?
this is especially significant around sensitive topics where being careless with words can cause harm.
Harm to ourselves or to others? Estimating expected utility is pretty complicated in cases where we have to weigh up upsetting others (according to the value we directly assign to others’ utility in our utility functions), upsetting others (according to the harm we estimate to ourselves through creating enemies) and benefiting ourselves (by rapidly screening off others who we don’t wish to interact with). I imagine typical individuals are generally doing all of these calculations at some level in typical interactions and it is not clear to me that we consistently err in any particular direction.
I actually wrote all but the last two paragraphs of this post weeks and weeks ago, so I can’t remember what individual things I had in mind at the time. I assign about a 65% chance that I was thinking about discussions of pickup or something similar.
Is there a particular practical upshot, or an example that you were thinking of? I think the principle of “maximize expected utility, rather than assume the most probable outcome” is pretty mainstream already around here.
The “including verbal behavior” bit in the summary was really what I had in mind. I think that while we may act according to expected utility, we rarely remember to speak according to expected utility, and this is especially significant around sensitive topics where being careless with words can cause harm.
Trouble is, people tend to behave like real-life Nozick’s utility monsters when it comes to the disutility they profess to suffer from speech that offends their sensibilities. I am not a utilitarian, but even if I were, I don’t see how I could ever bring myself to speak (or rather keep quiet) according to expected utility.
(This is a statement about people in general, not meant as a jab at any concrete persons here.)
Utilitarians should take into account all consequences, including the cost of creating incentives to become utility monsters.
I think there’s probably an imbalance between the amount of effort people are expected to expend in not being offensive vs the amount of effort people are expected to expend in not being offended. I’m not sure where it comes from.
steven0461:
The practical impossibility of taking into account such game-theoretical considerations and other important indirect effects of decisions is one of the (less important) reasons why I see little to no worth in utilitarianism.
Nevertheless, your point is very good.
I don’t think you can work towards not being offended. {according to my very narrow definition, which I now retract} It’s just a gut reaction.
You can choose whether to nurse your offense or not nurse it, and you can choose whether to suggest to others that they should be offended. Reactions that are involuntary in the moment itself are sometimes voluntary in the longer run.
Taking offense is a tactic in politics and social interaction however as in ‘the politics of offense’. People will tend to use the tactic more when it appears to be successful.
Get a group of friends where you constantly make (facetious) offensive remarks at one another’s expense, both about individual qualities and group identifications. Eventually, having been called a filthy whatever-ethnicity or a loathsome whatever-sexual-orientation (including loathsome heterosexual, hey why not?) or a Christ-killer or a baby-eating atheist so many times, the emotional impact of such statements will be dulled, which will improve your ability to understand your actual objections and react usefully when you hear people seriously say such things. Worked for me!
I think it’s possible to work towards not being offended by such things as remembering the times when one was accidentally offensive, by checking on whether one’s standards are reasonable, and by evaluating actual risks of what the offensive thing might indicate.
That doesn’t mean one can or should run one’s offendedness down to zero, but (depending one where you’re starting), it’s possible to town it down.
Speech is hella hard to be rational about because the penalty for inaction when speaking in groups is high—if you value having a chance to speak, and if your group isn’t using a formal scheduling algorithm to give all would-be speakers their time slice. You can end up entirely excluded from the conversation just for hesitating. Therefore in most circumstances people speak “from cache”, so it seems to me.
Ever hung out with a group of friends who used a talking stick or similar token? If so, was the average quality of conversation much higher than with other groups of similar size and median IQ?
Great! I find that comment more concise, and more easy to apply, than the post.
I’ll edit it in, then.
Harm to ourselves or to others? Estimating expected utility is pretty complicated in cases where we have to weigh up upsetting others (according to the value we directly assign to others’ utility in our utility functions), upsetting others (according to the harm we estimate to ourselves through creating enemies) and benefiting ourselves (by rapidly screening off others who we don’t wish to interact with). I imagine typical individuals are generally doing all of these calculations at some level in typical interactions and it is not clear to me that we consistently err in any particular direction.
I think this probably varies a lot depending on the person.
Huh. Any examples on your mind? I can’t form a concrete idea of what’s to be avoided.
I actually wrote all but the last two paragraphs of this post weeks and weeks ago, so I can’t remember what individual things I had in mind at the time. I assign about a 65% chance that I was thinking about discussions of pickup or something similar.