I upvoted this post, and I want to qualify that upvote. I upvoted this post because I believe it raises a substantial point, but I feel like it doesn't have enough, for lack of a better term, punch, to it. Part of my lack of conviction is based in how I'm not very well-educated on the manners of moral psychology, or philosophy, either, and I suspect this would be cleared up if I were to study it more. Shminux, you might not recognize me, but I'm Evan from the meetup. Anyway, I remember at the last meetup we both attended a couple of weeks ago when we discussed the Politics is the Mind-Killer sub-sequence, you mentioned how most people who call themselves "consequentialists" like Andrew are actually just "aspiring consequentialists", because, while they may be signaling their allegiance to an ethical philosophy they find more appealing than the default norms for humans, they're still constrained by the quick heuristics imposed upon us by our genetic histories, which better conform to a less formal ethical philosophy, like virtue ethics. I believe that was a decent point you made, whether or not that same train of thought was the one that inspired this post.
For the record, I too can find a a grain of virtue ethics in my own moral decisions.
My naive hypothesis would be that people who identify as consequentialists, and who have read, and internalized, a consequentialist mindset, would be more able to think along consequentialist lines than someone who isn't as well-versed in literary philosophy. I wouldn't be surprised if this hypothesis was easily falsified by experimental philosophy, though. I wouldn't be surprised either if humans who self-identify as consequentialists also go with their intuitions about what actions will increase, or decrease, whatever they call 'utility', rather than going through an explicit and rigorous cost-benefit calculation. In this sense, I don't perceive people who self-identify as utilitarian, or consequentialist, as more significant, or worthy of our attention, the closer their actions naively fit the mold of however the layperson of ethical philosophy would act.
For the record, I too can find a a grain of virtue ethics in my own moral decisions.
First, I do not think that there is anything wrong with virtue ethics as long as we recognize that it is one of several robust computational shortcuts, and not the one true normative ethics. It is quite rational to use all the tools in your disposal. It is irrational for a human to proclaim oneself to be a consequentialist, because no one is. A form of consequentialism is essential for FAI, since virtue- or rule-based shortcuts are bound to fail on the edge cases, and an...
Disclaimer: I am not a philosopher, so this post will likely seem amateurish to the subject matter experts.
LW is big on consequentialism, utilitarianism and other quantifiable ethics one can potentially program into a computer to make it provably friendly. However, I posit that most of us intuitively use virtue ethics, and not deontology or consequentialism. In other words, when judging one's actions we intuitively value the person's motivations over the rules they follow or the consequences of said actions. We may reevaluate our judgment later, based on laws and/or actual or expected usefulness, but the initial impulse still remains, even if overridden. To quote Casimir de Montrond, "Mistrust first impulses; they are nearly always good" (the quote is usually misattributed to Talleyrand).
Some examples:
I am not sure how to classify religious fanaticism (or other bigotry), but it seems to require a heavy dose of virtue ethics (feeling righteous), in addition to following the (deontological) tenets of whichever belief, with some consequentialism (for the greater good) mixed in.
When I try to introspect my own moral decisions (like whether to tell the truth, or to cheat on a test, or to drive over the speed limit), I can usually find a grain of virtue ethics inside. It might be followed or overridden, sometimes habitually, but it is always there. Can you?