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username2 comments on Open Thread May 16 - May 22, 2016 - Less Wrong Discussion
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One very important question a moral system has to answer is: how do you deal with people who won't adopt the moral system? Here are three basic answers:
Are there others? Which one of these options seems the best to you?
Interacting with those people in limited settings. Using different systems in different settings. A system doesn't have to encompass all human interactions.
Use rewards instead of punishments. Similar to your second point, but feels differently.
By the way, your third point is a special case of your second one.
I feel strongly that there is a qualitative difference between fence-building and compulsion, especially if the fenced area is small.
Your first suggestion seems like fence-building in different domains (social, financial, etc).
That's a weird definition of compulsion in this context. Others want to make choices. Sometimes those choices impact things you value. Sometime they doesn't.
But preventing people from acting on choices seems like the common thread. Privileging whether things you value are effected seems relevant to whether the prevention is morally justified, but from point of view of preventing the implementation of another's choice, the idea of compulsion seems identical.
In short, I assert the morally neutral description of an action ought not to vary based on moral judgment about the action.
I agree. In crude terms, compulsion is forcing other people to change; fence-building is yourself withdrawing.
This distinction is blurry. Which side do boycotts fall on?
Public, organized boycotts are compulsion since they have the clear goal of changing the others' behaviour. If you just quietly stop buying products from Acme without telling everyone (including Acme) about it, that's withdrawal.