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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   4080 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 7, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

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I think we do have a positive obligation to help others, which when taken seriously also leads to considerations like encouraging self-sufficiency. There's no contradiction there. I don't think we should really ever let people die from easily preventable causes. Either we should step in and forcibly change their culture if it's that bad, or we should feed them if it's not that bad (and thus their issues are caused by external factors outside of their control).

I think we do have a positive obligation to help others,

It depends what you mean by "help". I know a woman who "helps" her stoner grandson by covering his rent and living costs, while dude does absolutely nothing with his life. I don't think she has any obligation to do that, and I think she's making thing worse, in fact.

There's no contradiction there.

Not strictly speaking, but these are forces pulling in opposite directions.

I don't think we should really ever let people die from easily preventable causes.

You do you, but I disagree, and again would argue that people have no obligation to help those that won't help themselves, no matter how preventable their causes are.

Either we should step in and forcibly change their culture if it's that bad,

This has been deemed taboo by the powers that be, and until that taboo is abolished you have no right to wag your finger at people who won't shell out $5K to save the life of someone on the other side of the planet.

and thus their issues are caused by external factors outside of their control

Nowadays this is only true on an individual level (talented people born into corrupt societies), or as an immediate result of a natural disaster.

I think we do have a positive obligation to help others,

It depends what you mean by "help". I know a woman who "helps" her stoner grandson by covering his rent and living costs, while dude does absolutely nothing with his life. I don't think she has any obligation to do that, and I think she's making thing worse, in fact.

There's no contradiction there.

Not strictly speaking, but these are forces pulling in opposite directions.

I think compassion and charity naturally lead to "I want this person to have a better life" which naturally leads to "I want this person to be self-sufficient." It is good and ennobling to not have to rely on charity your whole life, so those who provide charity should naturally want that for their beneficiaries. These forces pull in the same direction unless you have been suckered by the prevailing counter-narrative, which is that any expectation or desire for self-sufficiency is uncharitable. That counter-narrative couldn't be more wrong.

I agree that at some point charity becomes harmful, but if you're talking about extremely powerful organizations like the US, there are alternatives besides giving up. Your friend can't ground her grandson, but if she could (say, if he was much younger), she should continue covering his rent and living costs and also confiscate the drugs. We have the power to do that on a national level.

I don't think we should really ever let people die from easily preventable causes.

You do you, but I disagree, and again would argue that people have no obligation to help those that won't help themselves, no matter how preventable their causes are.

If the man refuses to learn how to fish then at some point maybe it's better to let him starve to death, but not until we've put in a lot more effort than we are currently putting in.

Nowadays this is only true on an individual level (talented people born into corrupt societies), or as an immediate result of a natural disaster.

If a nation's culture turns people into lackadaisical troublemakers who deserve to die, then allowing children to be raised in such a culture is if anything worse than allowing them to die--one involves an innocent child's death, the other an innocent child's corruption into a moral mutant.

If the difference is entirely biological, and thus the children are already latent moral mutants, then sure, leave them be, but I don't think it is biological. Africans are people after all, and people are generally capable of self-reflection and change.

This has been deemed taboo by the powers that be, and until that taboo is abolished you have no right to wag your finger at people who won't shell out $5K to save the life of someone on the other side of the planet.

Well that's why I'm talking about abolishing that taboo. In the meantime I can certainly wag my finger at those who both uphold the taboo and won't shell out $5k to save a life. There are more than enough of those in America to save every $5k life in Africa.

It is good and ennobling to not have to rely on charity your whole life, so those who provide charity should naturally want that for their beneficiaries. These forces pull in the same direction unless you have been suckered by the prevailing counter-narrative, which is that any expectation or desire for self-sufficiency is uncharitable.

You can want it for them all you want, but if you keep bailing people out, they'll come to expect it, and start acting accordingly. If you can show me how you successfully pulled a community into self-sufficiency, then you can start telling me how these forces pull in the same direction, at the moment it just flies in the face of observable reality.

Your friend can't ground her grandson, but if she could (say, if he was much younger), she should continue covering his rent and living costs and also confiscate the drugs. We have the power to do that on a national level.

There's something to be said for autonomy, even if it leads to bad outcomes, both at the personal and national level, but generally I'm not against what you're putting forward, the issue is that in current circumstances, it's not politically feasible.

If the man refuses to learn how to fish then at some point maybe it's better to let him starve to death, but not until we've put in a lot more effort than we are currently putting in.

From what I understand we actually put quite a lot of effort into a lot of these poor countries.

If a nation's culture turns people into lackadaisical troublemakers who deserve to die,

Hold on there, I reserve the term "deserve to die" for people who I'd personally pull the trigger on. People who will stay stuck in a defect-defect loop to the point of starvation do not meet these criteria, but they are also not my responsibility.

then allowing children to be raised in such a culture is if anything worse than allowing them to die--one involves an innocent child's death, the other an innocent child's corruption into a moral mutant.

Oh-oh. When you proposed a touch of authoritarianism above to solve the problem, I was not against it, but it's quickly starting to look like your "charity" is an excuse for global totalitarian control.

In the meantime I can certainly wag my finger at those who both uphold the taboo and won't shell out $5k to save a life.

Your original criticism didn't seem quite so precisely tailored, if this is who it's limited to, fair enough.

You can want it for them all you want, but if you keep bailing people out, they'll come to expect it, and start acting accordingly. If you can show me how you successfully pulled a community into self-sufficiency, then you can start telling me how these forces pull in the same direction, at the moment it just flies in the face of observable reality.

The outcome isn't relevant to this question. If you want what's best for someone, you want them to have both temporal prosperity and self-sufficiency. That's all.

On a personal level I can point to plenty of people who benefitted from this approach. This is pretty much all children. On a community level I'd point to South Korea, which has become quite successful in part due to large amounts of aid from the US.

There's something to be said for autonomy, even if it leads to bad outcomes, both at the personal and national level, but generally I'm not against what you're putting forward, the issue is that in current circumstances, it's not politically feasible.

I just don't get why you feel the need to say this to me. My whole point is that our efforts should be devoted towards making it politically feasible.

From what I understand we actually put quite a lot of effort into a lot of these poor countries.

Yes, somewhat, but it's not the right kind of effort. We provide them with resources and education without doing much to change the culture or their incentives.

Hold on there, I reserve the term "deserve to die" for people who I'd personally pull the trigger on. People who will stay stuck in a defect-defect loop to the point of starvation do not meet these criteria, but they are also not my responsibility.

Oh-oh. When you proposed a touch of authoritarianism above to solve the problem, I was not against it, but it's quickly starting to look like your "charity" is an excuse for global totalitarian control.

Children exist. $5,000 per life won't save many children but it will save some. Children bear no blame at all for the culture raising them. Your suggestion is that African culture is so bad that we should leave them to their own devices (to "starve" i.e. die to diseases we can easily prevent), which necessarily means also leaving children to starve. I strongly disagree, but I argue that if that is in fact your belief, you should be even more extreme than I am, and eradicate the entire culture utterly in order to save children from being corrupted into such worthless mongrels.

The "circle of control" (or, in this case, circle of responsibility) is a good, useful concept, but one thing I think it ignores is that we have a moral obligation to grow our circles of control. I shouldn't ever be content with mastery of a tiny circle of control; if the things under my control are doing well, I should expand and bring other things into that circle. If I'm taking care of myself well then it's time to start a family. If I can take care of my family well then it's time to help the community more. Starving children on Mars may not be our responsibility, but (inasmuch as we have the capacity) it is our responsibility to work towards making them our responsibility.

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