The Nonlinear Library EA - Three tricky biases: human bias, existence bias, and happy bias by Steven Rouk
Feb 5, 2024
18:04
Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Three tricky biases: human bias, existence bias, and happy bias, published by Steven Rouk on February 5, 2024 on The Effective Altruism Forum.
Introduction
While many types of biases are more commonly known and accounted for, I think there may be three especially tricky biases that influence our thinking about how to do good:
Human Bias
We are all human, which may influence us to systematically devalue nonhuman sentience.
Existence Bias
We all already exist as biologically evolved beings, which may influence us to systematically overvalue the potential future existence of other biologically evolved beings.[1]
Happy Bias
We are relatively happy[2] - or at least we are not actively being tortured or experiencing incapacitating suffering while thinking, writing, and working - which may influence us to systematically undervalue the importance of extreme suffering.[3]
Like other biases, these three influence our thinking and decision making unless we take steps to counteract them.
What makes these biases more difficult to counter is the fact that they are universally held by every human working on doing good in the world, and it's difficult to see how anyone thinking about, writing about, and working on issues of well-being and suffering could not have these qualities - there is no group of individuals without these qualities who can advocate for their point of view.
The point of this post is not to resolve these questions, but rather to prompt more reflection on these tricky biases and how they may be skewing our thinking and work in specific directions.[4]
For those who are already aware of and accounting for these biases, bravo! For the rest of us, I think this topic deserves at least a little thought, and potentially much more than a little, if we wish to increase the accuracy of our worldview. If normal biases are difficult to counteract, these are even more so.
Examples of How These Biases Might Affect Our Work
If we ask ourselves, "How might these three biases affect someone's thinking about how to do good?", some answers we come up with are things that may be present in our EA community thought, work, and allocation of resources.[5]
This could indicate that we have not done enough work to counteract these biases in our thinking, which would be a problem if moral intuitions are the hidden guides behind much of our prioritization (as has been suggested[6]). If our moral intuitions about fundamental ethical concepts are being invisibly biased by our being human, existing, and being relatively happy, then our conclusions may be heavily skewed. This is still true for those who use quantitative or probabilistic methods to determine their priorities, since once again moral intuitions are frequently required when setting many different values regarding moral weights, probabilities, etc.
When looked at through the lens of moral uncertainty[7], we could say that these biases would skew our weights or assessments of different moral theories in predictable directions.
Here are some specific examples of how these biases might show up in our thinking and work. In many cases, there is a bit more information in the footnotes.
Human Bias
Human bias would influence someone to focus the majority of their thinking and writing on human well-being.[8]
Human bias would lead the majority of funding and work to be directed towards predominantly-human cause areas.[9][10]
Human bias would influence someone to set humans as the standard for consciousness and well-being, with other beings falling somewhere below humans in their capacities.
Human bias would influence someone to grant more weight to scenarios where humans either are or become the majority of moral value as a way of rationalizing a disproportionate focus on humans.
Human bias would influence someone to devalue work that focuses ...
Introduction
While many types of biases are more commonly known and accounted for, I think there may be three especially tricky biases that influence our thinking about how to do good:
Human Bias
We are all human, which may influence us to systematically devalue nonhuman sentience.
Existence Bias
We all already exist as biologically evolved beings, which may influence us to systematically overvalue the potential future existence of other biologically evolved beings.[1]
Happy Bias
We are relatively happy[2] - or at least we are not actively being tortured or experiencing incapacitating suffering while thinking, writing, and working - which may influence us to systematically undervalue the importance of extreme suffering.[3]
Like other biases, these three influence our thinking and decision making unless we take steps to counteract them.
What makes these biases more difficult to counter is the fact that they are universally held by every human working on doing good in the world, and it's difficult to see how anyone thinking about, writing about, and working on issues of well-being and suffering could not have these qualities - there is no group of individuals without these qualities who can advocate for their point of view.
The point of this post is not to resolve these questions, but rather to prompt more reflection on these tricky biases and how they may be skewing our thinking and work in specific directions.[4]
For those who are already aware of and accounting for these biases, bravo! For the rest of us, I think this topic deserves at least a little thought, and potentially much more than a little, if we wish to increase the accuracy of our worldview. If normal biases are difficult to counteract, these are even more so.
Examples of How These Biases Might Affect Our Work
If we ask ourselves, "How might these three biases affect someone's thinking about how to do good?", some answers we come up with are things that may be present in our EA community thought, work, and allocation of resources.[5]
This could indicate that we have not done enough work to counteract these biases in our thinking, which would be a problem if moral intuitions are the hidden guides behind much of our prioritization (as has been suggested[6]). If our moral intuitions about fundamental ethical concepts are being invisibly biased by our being human, existing, and being relatively happy, then our conclusions may be heavily skewed. This is still true for those who use quantitative or probabilistic methods to determine their priorities, since once again moral intuitions are frequently required when setting many different values regarding moral weights, probabilities, etc.
When looked at through the lens of moral uncertainty[7], we could say that these biases would skew our weights or assessments of different moral theories in predictable directions.
Here are some specific examples of how these biases might show up in our thinking and work. In many cases, there is a bit more information in the footnotes.
Human Bias
Human bias would influence someone to focus the majority of their thinking and writing on human well-being.[8]
Human bias would lead the majority of funding and work to be directed towards predominantly-human cause areas.[9][10]
Human bias would influence someone to set humans as the standard for consciousness and well-being, with other beings falling somewhere below humans in their capacities.
Human bias would influence someone to grant more weight to scenarios where humans either are or become the majority of moral value as a way of rationalizing a disproportionate focus on humans.
Human bias would influence someone to devalue work that focuses ...