All of anonymous_ea_267's Comments + Replies
Well, I do believe that misrepresenting the views you're arguing against is dishonest. Especially so, if your essay is literally called "Why I’m Not a Negative Utilitarian"
I don't like Toby's "Why I'm Not a Negative Utilitarian" essay because I think it doesn't engage good arguments in favor of NU (to which I am partial). But I don't think it's in any way dishonest for him to have written an informal essay describing his views on the matter. I found it immensely helpful in understanding Toby's writings about the kind of utilitarianism he endorses.
Do I understand you correctly, you believe that the following (copied from the comment you're replying to) are acceptable practices in the type of an essay Toby Ord published?
He [Toby Ord] describes the academic literature incorrectly in a way that benefits his case. He writes that “A thorough going Negative Utilitarian would support the destruction of the world (even by violent means)” without mentioning that for many years, a published objection to his favoured view (classical utilitarianism) is that it implies that one should kill everyone and replace us, if one could thereby maximize the sum of well-being (see my paper The World Destruction Argument).
I'm not sure what you're implying. I only copied half of the quote to save reader's time.
I feel like you're trying to catch me out, but I don't understand why.
If you want my views on Toby's paper, the truth is I haven't read it. It's a good thing to represent counterarguments correctly, so that's too bad if he didn't do it well in this particular paper? At worst, this sounds like an argument that he made some mistakes in his work as an academic - but I wouldn't be in a position to judge. It doesn't sound dishonest.
Peter writes:
I have little allegiance to the people criticized here and if this was good criticism I would be one of the first people to say it.
It should be noted that Peter was profiled by William MacAskill (one of the main subjects of this post) in Quartz and was one of the few people profiled in William's book Doing Good Better. Chapter 9 of the book begins with:
...As Peter Hurford entered his final year at Denison University, he needed to figure out what he was going to do with his life. He was twenty-two, majoring in political science and psycholog
But what Bostom wrote is not just an "inflated impressive-sounding thing". He seems to have falsely claimed setting a national record in undergraduate performance. Does Peter consider false claims about setting academic records to be an acceptable practice?
I don't know. It still is very unfair to not hear from Bostrom - or even ask Bostrom! - what he meant by this.
It should be noted that Peter was profiled by William MacAskill (one of the main subjects of this post) in Quartz and was one of the few people profiled in William's book Doing Good Better.
I don't get what you're implying and I don't see this as a source of bias. This was mainly just about being in the right place at the right time, but I interact with Will very infrequently, get no personal benefit from helping Will, and suffer no harms from criticizing Will, and am currently not associated with Will in any way. I like Will, but that's solely because of Will being likable, not because of any background conspiracy.
The EA Syllabus is not an academic syllabus for the course, and "Why I'm Not a Negative Utilitarian" is not a journal-published academic paper (although it sure looks like one given the citations and structures, but is listed on Ord's website as an "unpolished idea"). Knutsson thinks that since it's directed toward the general public and not an academic audience, it's even more important that it represent all academic views fairly instead of just what the author believes. I think that it might be good to do that, but it's not unacceptable to not do that, as we can't apply academic standards to something that's not academic.