> Or is it a “they have sinned and you can’t pay off sin?”
Interesting. Yes, this is the closest of your choices. Not quite
Biblical Sin :), but that will do for the moment.
Please note that I asked a genuine, good-faith moral question. I'm
not making an assertion here.
I removed a remark that "perceived fairness is often more important in
human-centred affairs than summative outcomes" - but then noticed
that you teach human centred design and obviously get that. So let's
explore it together.
> many are reforestation projects in the developing world.
Regardless of how "good" the purchased offset is, it does not impact
the Kantian moral argument - in particular I am thinking about
universalisabilty. I don't think it matters whether one bribes the rich
or poor in this case. the question is about the ethics of transferable
responsibility - for which I used the obviously extreme edge case of
buying immunity from murder charges.
> I see this as "I made a mess in the street and I hired cleaners to
clean it up." Sure, I didn't do the cleaning myself, but I’m still
being responsible for it, right?
No, I think that's where I would differ. Let's say you made the mess
the next day, and the next, and the one after... and each day you pay
someone to clean it up. You're not off the hook. Somewhat like the
broken window fallacy, you're still creating a net loss to society.
Unless you think those cleaners have nothing better to do with their
lives than labour cleaning up your mess.
Let's consider another slightly more ordinary place this logic
operates and fails. Parking or speeding fines. Why do we have motoring
restrictions? Ultimately it's to reduce loss of life. Careless driving
or parking gets people killed. But paltry fines have no effect on
those who simply see it as an extra charge to be factored into being
an anti-social driver. Now suppose that instead I can simply pay
another driver to stay at home so I can speed around by the local
school and park across the hospital entrance.
Being "responsible for it" would be not making the mess in the first
place. You're "making amends for it" - those would be better words.
But if that delivers no deterrence from doing it again, a fundamental
aspect of justice necessary for regulating human affairs is not
served.
> Let's say you made the mess the next day, and the next, and the one after... and each day you pay someone to clean it up. You're not off the hook. Somewhat like the broken window fallacy, you're still creating a net loss to society. Unless you think those cleaners have nothing better to do with their lives than labour cleaning up your mess.
We do pay people to clean up our messes. There's entire industries of janitors, street sweepers, repairmen and garbage disposal. Which provides additional jobs, increases time for everyone else to do other things and increases the economic pie. Do carbon offsets work differently?
> it does not impact the Kantian moral argument
Do we care about some moral argument, or do we care about mitigating climate change?
That X has happened in the past is not a moral argument for X
> Do we care about some moral argument, or do we care about mitigating
climate change?
That's a false dichotomy since the two are not mutually exclusive.
Yes, we do care about some moral argument, and indeed all moral
arguments. They often get down to the root causes quicker than 5Y
analysis. For a gentle introduction to the intersection of ethics and
systems theory see [1].
>Somewhat like the broken window fallacy, you're still creating a net loss to society.
This an economic argument, not a moral one, and I think it's wrong. In theory.
Presumably, the idea is that if you can afford to pay to fix the mess, you have rendered sufficient credit to society to offset the loss caused by making the mess. And if we assume that both you and the mess-cleaner are rational agents, and you choose to pay somebody else to fix the mess instead of doing it yourself (or not making it in the first place), and they choose to take your money to clean it up instead of doing something else, then we must conclude that cleaning (or not making) the mess was not an efficient use of your time, and was an efficient use of theirs.
The reason this feels weird is because tons of people have way more money than they should, and others have way less than they should. Idealized capitalism breaks down in a world where rich people can sit back and watch money pour in for free from their "investments".
As you say yourself, there's no basis to the "assumption" of nice
rational actors in a zero sum game within in a singular homogeneous
society of little Bayesian utility maximisers - that's precisely the
simplistic fantasy that's landed us in this damn awful mess. Some
people get away with it. Some get screwed over. Hence I am questioning
such moral arithmetic.
Interesting. Yes, this is the closest of your choices. Not quite Biblical Sin :), but that will do for the moment.
Please note that I asked a genuine, good-faith moral question. I'm not making an assertion here.
I removed a remark that "perceived fairness is often more important in human-centred affairs than summative outcomes" - but then noticed that you teach human centred design and obviously get that. So let's explore it together.
> many are reforestation projects in the developing world.
Regardless of how "good" the purchased offset is, it does not impact the Kantian moral argument - in particular I am thinking about universalisabilty. I don't think it matters whether one bribes the rich or poor in this case. the question is about the ethics of transferable responsibility - for which I used the obviously extreme edge case of buying immunity from murder charges.
> I see this as "I made a mess in the street and I hired cleaners to clean it up." Sure, I didn't do the cleaning myself, but I’m still being responsible for it, right?
No, I think that's where I would differ. Let's say you made the mess the next day, and the next, and the one after... and each day you pay someone to clean it up. You're not off the hook. Somewhat like the broken window fallacy, you're still creating a net loss to society. Unless you think those cleaners have nothing better to do with their lives than labour cleaning up your mess.
Let's consider another slightly more ordinary place this logic operates and fails. Parking or speeding fines. Why do we have motoring restrictions? Ultimately it's to reduce loss of life. Careless driving or parking gets people killed. But paltry fines have no effect on those who simply see it as an extra charge to be factored into being an anti-social driver. Now suppose that instead I can simply pay another driver to stay at home so I can speed around by the local school and park across the hospital entrance.
Being "responsible for it" would be not making the mess in the first place. You're "making amends for it" - those would be better words. But if that delivers no deterrence from doing it again, a fundamental aspect of justice necessary for regulating human affairs is not served.