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Spurlock comments on The Dark Arts - Preamble - Less Wrong
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From a consequentialist standpoint, I agree that leaving her happy is better than leaving her crying.
However, it's not definitely right to comfort people using religious ideas you know are wrong, unless you intend to correct them later or something. Then its just hazy.
Where it gets really muddled though, is where nothing you're saying is necessarily false, but it wouldn't seem true without your mentioning it. Like, the link between reasserting her "caring nature", donating to the charity, and dealing with her father's death. And how she can reconstruct her life and assert her values by combining them.
She would not come up with that on her own, but once she starts thinking about it/herself that way, I think there are compelling arguments that it actually becomes that way. Or at least feels like that way, and lacks objective evidence to the contrary. Which might be enough in self-concept stuff?
Sorry if the last paragraph (or two) is a bit mysterious or hard to follow -- I'm confused about the subject.
It is muddy. To me a sort of deontological approach makes sense of this (I'm sure anyone who prefers utilitarianism can convert this somehow). Basically, I wouldn't want to live in a world where salesmen were encouraged to take advantage of your vulnerable emotional state in order to push products on you, even if they make you feel better (yes, I already live in this world, but still).
There's still a non-dirty-feeling option, which might be to find some other charity that saves kid's lives and help the woman donate to that. It might seem like, all things considered, this is the same result but requiring more work, making it a questionable choice from a utility point of view. But ultimately I just don't trust human beings, even myself, to not act selfishly, and to distinguish at all times between rationality and rationalizing.
In short, I can see how an argument could be made that taking advantage of her emotional state to help save lives is a morally acceptable option. I just don't trust anyone making that argument that has a stake in it. The safe bet is to always look for the third option, just in case.