Moral offset
A moral offset or ethics offset is an action (usually a payment) taken to counteract an immoral act in such a way that the world would prefer the immoral act followed by the moral offset rather than have neither actions take place. For instance, a meat-eater may eat meat and then donate to an animal welfare charity in such a way that even animal welfare advocates would prefer this outcome to that of the meat-eater not eating meat and not donating to the charity.
- https://www.facebook.com/mulldrifting/posts/674495997486
- “Vegetarianism for Meat-Eaters” suggests donating to animal charities to offset the harm of eating meat.
- Ethics Offsets
- When should an Effective Altruist be vegetarian?
- “Can we offset immorality?”. July 21, 2016. Rational Reflection. Retrieved February 17, 2018.
“Contra Askell On Moral Offsets”. Slate Star Codex. August 28, 2017. Retrieved February 17, 2018. Discussion at “Contra Askell On Moral Offsets • r/slatestarcodex”. reddit. Retrieved February 17, 2018.
Christianity
Examples
Carbon offset
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[Thomas C. Kinnaman] concludes that the social good would be optimized by subsidizing the recycling of some metals, and by imposing a $15 tax on each ton of trash that goes to the landfill. That tax would offset the environmental costs, chiefly the greenhouse impact, and allow each municipality to make a guilt-free choice based on local economics and its citizens’ wishes. The result, Dr. Kinnaman predicts, would be a lot less recycling than there is today.
See also
External links
- Self-licensing and Moral credential
- Pigovian tax and Sin tax
- “Moral Offsetting” on the Practical Ethics blog
- “Ethics in an unethical world: Ethics Offsets” discusses offsets for the use of patented multimedia codecs.
- Is Moral Offsetting™ Right for You?
- “Ethical offsetting is antithetical to EA”; see also the Facebook discussion of the post.
I like this quote from the comment:
↩Cash transfers significantly relieve poverty of humans who are alive today, and are fairly efficient at doing that. They are far less efficient at helping or harming non-human animals or increasing or reducing existential risk. Even if they have some negative effect here or there (more meat-eating, or habitat destruction, or carbon emissions) the cost of producing a comparable benefit to offset it in that dimension will be small compared to the cash transfer. E.g. an allocation of 90% GiveDirectly, and 10% to offset charities (carbon reduction, meat reduction, nuclear arms control, whatever) will wind up positive on multiple metrics.
