So in Eliezer's meta-ethics he talks about the abstract computation called "right", whereas in e.g. CEV he talks about stuff like reflective endorsement. So in other words in one place he's talking about goodness as a formal cause and in another he's talking about goodness as a final cause. Does he argue anywhere that these should be expected to be the same thing? I realize that postulating their equivalence is not an unreasonable guess but it's definitely not immediately or logically obvious, non? I suspect that Eliezer's just not making a clear distinction between formal and final causes because his model of causality sees them as two sides of the same Platonic timeless coin, but as far as philosophy goes I think he'd need to flesh out his intuitions more before it's clear if that makes sense; is this fleshing out to be found or hinted at anywhere in the sequences?
They're not the same. CEV is an attempt to define a procedure that can infer morality by examining the workings of a big bunch of sometimes confused human brains just like you might try to infer mathematical truths by examining the workings of a big bunch of sometimes buggy calculators. The hope is that CEV finds morality, but it's not the same as morality, any more than math is defined to be the output of a certain really well made calculator.
This is for anyone in the LessWrong community who has made at least some effort to read the sequences and follow along, but is still confused on some point, and is perhaps feeling a bit embarrassed. Here, newbies and not-so-newbies are free to ask very basic but still relevant questions with the understanding that the answers are probably somewhere in the sequences. Similarly, LessWrong tends to presume a rather high threshold for understanding science and technology. Relevant questions in those areas are welcome as well. Anyone who chooses to respond should respectfully guide the questioner to a helpful resource, and questioners should be appropriately grateful. Good faith should be presumed on both sides, unless and until it is shown to be absent. If a questioner is not sure whether a question is relevant, ask it, and also ask if it's relevant.