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On Bryan Caplan's ethical intuitionism
Bryan offers the most extensive version of his view I've seen him blog. On overall method and meta-ethics, I'm not so far from Bryan (and someday he will get a post in praise of him). But I usually disagree with his applications of the method. For instance he seems to argue that because employees are allowed to discriminate against employers, we should allow for a reciprocal right of employer discrimination.
My first objection is that we cannot judge an argument like this outside of a particular historical context. In some cases employer discrimination rights may be fine, in others not. I don't think ethical intuitionism, as could be represented by abstract reasoning from analogy. can do the hard work here. Rather we must look to the history to understand the meaning and long-term effects of the discriminatory act under question. In some cases the discrimination is effectively perpetuating a regime of evil and thus it is morally wrong.
Here is another part of Bryan's argument:
Suppose A and B be are dating. A has an equally good outside option. B can't bear to live without A. A therefore has some bargaining power - vastly more than most employers, in fact. Yet almost everyone thinks it would be wrong to force A to stay with B.
If there is one intuition that many reasonable people have, it is that family and personal relationships are not, in moral terms, exactly like commercial or work place relationships. I get nervous when I see ethical intuitionists serve up simple analogies across these various realms. (In general I think Bryan creates too much license for analogical reasoning of this kind.) This is also why I am not convinced by all of the arguments in Steve Landsburg's Fair Play.
My overall view is that ethical intuitionism settles many fewer issues than most of its proponents like to think. That said, there is often nowhere else to go. We somehow need to come to terms with two propositions at the same time:
1. We need to think more rather than less ethically.
2. The content of ethical philosophy tells us less, in reliable terms, than most people would like to believe.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on November 23, 2009 at 06:06 AM in Philosophy | Permalink
Comments
Usually libertarians make this argument about rights, and progressives make this argument about power, and the conversation typically ends there. So it's nice to see Bryan continue to engage with the dating analogy.
Interesting as the ethical ideas are, I'm very leary of Tyler's statement that "we need to think more rather than less ethically." Most of the debates over these issues are about government, not individual, action. To say that something is ethical is not to say that the government should enforce it.
Posted by: David Wright at Nov 23, 2009 6:27:47 AM
Just because two sets of relationships are both asymmetric doesn't mean that they are otherwise equivalent.
Posted by: matt wilbert at Nov 23, 2009 7:24:00 AM
Wonder if Tyler read Adam Smith's other book?
Steve
Posted by: Ralph at Nov 23, 2009 7:24:06 AM
You could (with a bit of tweaking) replace "ethical" with "economics" and the two propositions would work equally well, the most significant difference being, perhaps, what we mean by "reliable."
Posted by: Bryan at Nov 23, 2009 9:11:01 AM
You could (with a bit of tweaking) replace "ethical" with "economics" and the two propositions would work equally well, the most significant difference being, perhaps, what we mean by "reliable."
Posted by: Bryan at Nov 23, 2009 9:12:15 AM
Actually, I think there is a social cost when A dumps B with the only available reason being, "he had other options". That's why the whole process of dumping is generally uncomfortable without an obvious cause like cheating. Outside people may view him as a bit of a cad, and B can probably draw some sympathy. I don't think anyone would use force to keep them together, but they may apply other pressures to convince A to stay.
Posted by: bellisaurius at Nov 23, 2009 9:25:16 AM
Tyler, your 2nd paragraph appears to make the claim that the outcome is more important than the governing principle. While I don't completely agree with Caplan (or many other behavioral economists for that matter), I think it's wrong to put such a high emphasis on outcomes. What's important is not equality, but rather justice.
In my opinion, anyway.
Posted by: Ryan at Nov 23, 2009 9:26:44 AM
Ryan: Why is justice more important than outcomes? The only thing that really affects human beings is outcomes. As long as I get what I want, I don't give a flip about justice. I believe that the only reason humans devised the idea of a justice system was as a means to an end: to solve the Hobbesian problem and produce better outcomes for all.
Anyway, in Bryan's dating analogy, it's not so clear to me that "it would be wrong to force A to stay with B." It depends on the situation. There is not enough information to make a determination about whether or not it is wrong to keep them together. For example, did A make a commitment to B that influenced his/her decisions? An example of this would be if they had a child, and A made a commitment, whether implicit or explicit, to make a living for the family while B took care of the child. In that case, I don't think it would be wrong.
In the employer situation, let's say an employer hired someone. As a result, the employee rented an apartment. Now the employer fires that person, who is now locked into monthly rent that he can no longer afford, and so accumulates debt. That seems wrong to me; it is because of the employer's actions that the former employee is in debt.
Posted by: libert at Nov 23, 2009 9:49:00 AM
I'm personally more skeptical of the claim that ethical philosophy doesn't take us far. It ultimately doesn't take us far enough, and it may often require more intelligence than most people have available, but it usually takes us a lot farther than our intuitions do in my experience, as our intuitions are usually mostly an expression of VERY bad ethical philosophy that we are taught as small children.
(see, they said Keynes was becoming more popular again)
Posted by: michael vassar at Nov 23, 2009 10:50:27 AM
Caplan cites Landsburg approvingly on discrimination. This is a perfect example of being so wrapped up in one's own ideological blanket as to lose all sensory contact with the rest of the world.
Repeat after me:
That's not how discrimination works.
The way it works is that there is a minority that is looked down and regarded as inferior by the majority. The discrimination is widespread and self-reinforcing, and affects the minority's lives in all sorts of negative ways. That's the issue, not an Albanian looking for work. If Caplan doesn't understand that, and he doesn't seem to, then he's a fool who has nothing useful to say on the subject, no matter how many books he's read.
Among its many other flaws the argument assumes symmetry between job-seeker and potential employer. Guess what - there is no such symmetry. A member of the minority often has no choice but to work for a member of the majority because - big surprise - those are the people in position to hire.
Ethnic or racial discrimination tends to be a society-wide phenomenon. If you don't see that, and insist on talking as if it's all about some eccentric nutball who doesn't like Albanians then you can't be taken seriously.
Posted by: Bernard Yomtov at Nov 23, 2009 11:25:43 AM
Libert said: "Ryan: Why is justice more important than outcomes? The only thing that really affects human beings is outcomes. As long as I get what I want, I don't give a flip about justice. I believe that the only reason humans devised the idea of a justice system was as a means to an end: to solve the Hobbesian problem and produce better outcomes for all."
My reply is that without justice, an undesireable outcome can never be realistically overturned without re-writing the legal code. The world has chosen to go in your direction on this, so you "win." But a consistent dedication to principles of justice would yield outcomes that everyone could understand and empathize with, even if we don't always "get what we want."
But in replying to this, I already understand that you don't care about that. You have clearly stated that getting what you want is the only important thing to you. We are talking about Rule of Law here, and the political philosophers I agree with (Locke, Jefferson, Smith, et al.) take my view of things. It's not the popular viewpoint these days, so I understand your objection.
Posted by: Ryan at Nov 23, 2009 12:47:25 PM
I like your two propositions, but number 1 is more important than number 2. And Michael Vassar is right that philosophy really does have a lot to contribute.
Posted by: David J. Balan at Nov 23, 2009 2:59:38 PM
"If there is one intuition that many reasonable people have, it is that family and personal relationships are not, in moral terms, exactly like commercial or work place relationships."
So, you say that there is some fundamental difference between "personal" relationship and "business" relationship. Sure, there is. However, you forgot to mention the RELEAVANT difference in case of discrimination. It's like saying "You are not allowed to discriminate in this situation, because it is 12 am". Sure, it is. Sure, in another situation it is not. However - why should that be relevant?
If you want to criticize somebody for making a bad analogy, you have to show not only that the situations are different - but that the difference is actually relevant to the question being asked. You did not.
Posted by: andy at Nov 23, 2009 3:02:45 PM
we must look to the history to understand the meaning and long-term effects of the discriminatory act under question. In some cases the discrimination is effectively perpetuating a regime of evil and thus it is morally wrong.
I overlooked this earlier. Of course it's correct, though I would strengthen "some cases" to "many or most cases."
Posted by: Bernard Yomtov at Nov 23, 2009 7:15:43 PM
What David Wright said. And Steve.
Interpersonal ethics is not a sufficient guide to how to organize a society - at least not of one larger than an extended family. Symmetry between buyer and seller might be ideal except that systematic discrimination is a great injustice that undermines a society and hence deserves to be fought even at some cost to perfect justice in another sphere.
Posted by: capitalistimperialistpig at Nov 23, 2009 9:28:35 PM
I wonder if Caplan might be right about the ethics after all - that discriminatory employers and employees (who refuse to work for blacks, for example) are exactly in the same boat morally (both are equally bad persons). Of course, there is an important practical difference, and this difference allows the law and other institutions to treat the two differently. One (the employer) may be required to *act* better than his heart, and the other not. This legal requirement is completely extra-moral, though it's there to prevent moral harm. A parallel requirement on the employee to chose employers without vile discrimination would be intrusive and unenforcable, but more importantly, it would serve no significant public good.
So employees are allowed by law to choose in immoral ways, though employers are not. This is OK once it's clear that the reason for this double standard is not a difference in the immorality in the two kinds of discrimination, but rather a difference in other practical matters. This would hardly be surprising, because there are many cases where just laws and clear ethical principles don't overlap. It's perfectly legal for me to tell dreadful lies to my lover, and it's illegal for me to go on red even when I can see the intersection is perfectly clear and going would be clearly harmless.
I think that once we clearly tease apart which intuitions are about the morality of a deed and which are about "just laws" which would cover certain *types* of deeds, much confusion could be spared.
Posted by: David at Nov 24, 2009 4:56:03 AM
I think your problem is that you don't think of employers as human beings.
Posted by: roversaurus at Nov 24, 2009 10:12:15 AM
Don't waste your time on a man/woman, who isn't willing to waste their time on you.
Don't try so hard, the best things come when you least expect them to.
Posted by: Ugg london at Jan 11, 2010 10:24:53 PM
