Chapter 5.Simplemoral Engagements

Chapter 5.SimpleMoral Engagements

Imagine that I have a region in my brain, let’s call it the right temporoparietal junction, which lets me plan good ways to anticipate your actions.Using this part of my brain I can treat you as a moral agent whose actions matter to me. If you can understand these sentences, that is proof that you also have such a capacity.Neuroscience research has in fact demonstrated the location of this function just above and behind our right ear (Bzdok et al. 2012; Koster-Hale et al. 2013).Here is a surprise: the right temporoparietal junction region functions precisely to plan mutually successful moral actions.In laboratory experiments, mild electrical interference in this region disrupts moral choice (Decety and Lamm 2007).

This is not the biological seat of “conscience.”But there is sound reason to believe individuals only act morally when this bit of double perspective on what counts – yours and mine together – is functioning properly.We can fake it with ego-centric or caringor cheating or other approaches because they do not require a functioning right temporoparietal junction.Often these moves have the effect we intend, but as we saw in the last two chapters, the smart money is backing reciprocal moral agency.

Subhuman animals and children can use one-perspective decision rules such as best-strategy or coercion or contempt – and even altruism -- but they lack the neural equipment to go to the next level and plan together for the mutually most meaningful future.Only adult humans are capable of creating moral communities.

Without a functioning right temporoparietal junction, the following story is not very funny.I havekept the prices as I remember hearing them when young, which means one has to adjust for inflation.A customer asked the butcher how much he wants for chickens.“Thirty-nine cents, Lady.You want one?”

“Thirty-nine cents!That’s outrageous.Too much.The guy across the street sells chickens for twenty-nine cents.I know, I asked.”

“Okay, fine.Buy your chicken from that guy.”

“Well, he doesn’t have chickens just now.”

“Yea, he’s a crook.When I don’t have chickens, I sell them for nineteen cents.”

This and the next chapter show how to find rmaunder a great many circumstances.It is also an opportunity to sample the wide range of moral challenges and show how different circumstances call for different responses.

Five Simple Engagements

Walking on a busy sidewalk is a moral activity – admittedly one of taken-for-granted triviality.Most individuals manage to synchronize their movementsand get to various personally desired locations, often when the straight path for each runs right into a mother with her arms full of packages and a baby in the stroller.We instinctively adjust, and the modifications are anything but random, driven by public rules, or simple turn taking.We do not run over people even when we have the right of way.To see how this is moral business, consider the anger generated by a careless pedestrian on a cell phone, four teenagers walking with locked arms, or a lout who knocks down an elderly person in haste.We make modifications when we are late; when others appear distracted or self-absorbed. Our flow is dictated by the width of the sidewalk and the presence of obstructions such as trash cans, telephone poles, and the volume of traffic.We seem to recognize that walking self-interestedly, coercive or contemptuous sidewalk behavior, bluffing and false signals are inappropriate.Even the amusing embarrassment of “you first; no after you” could be improved upon.Most walking is good: some is “wrong.”Everybody “knows how to rma” when we want to.[1]

The intelligent way to walk differs for empty and busy streets, when in dangerous neighborhoods, when racing to save an injured friend, tip-toing on ice, or when a kindergarten class is crossing holding hands.We adjust both to others and to the circumstances.We expect that others will do the same.Although there is generally one best goal when working together, there are systematic modifications required depending on the circumstances.In this and the next chapter every possible variation will be presented in terms of prototypical moral engagements.

Win-Win

Mr. Nice was a successful software engineer before retiring to a small town.With some time on his hands and a natural love of people, he approached the director of the local Meals on Wheels program and asked about volunteering.The director spent a little time with Mr. Nice, found him shy but polite, and sent him out on a trial run with a veteran of the program.

This is the bare bones for a moral engagement.It has certain essential features and many incidental ones.A systematic approach will help to highlight the key factors.This is called a moral framing exercise, and there will be many examples throughout this book.So we will start very slowly.

Because moral engagements have a 2 x 2 structure, it is best to begin by identifying the two agents and the two strategies available to each agent.Mr. Nice could decide to volunteer for Meals on Wheels or he could look for other outlets for his time.The director could offer Mr. Nice a position or she could steer him away.That means there are four potential outcomes: “Volunteer” / “Offer”; “Volunteer” / “No offer”; “Decline” / “Offer”; and “Decline” / “No offer.”Of the four future worlds, which is best?Mr. Nice has his own personal preference rank ordering over these futures; the director has hers.These may be the same and they may be different.They may even be different from the preferences of third parties, such as readers.It will be assumed throughout that the preferences of the agents are the ones that drive the action.

Consider each of the possible outcomes.From the director’s perspective, [4]we might assume that she would be delighted to have another volunteer, apparently one with time and interest.Of course one never knows whether folks who are new to town will last long enough to justify the training, and there is no one locally to give a reference.[3]Another outcome would be the combination of passing for the time being a candidate who appears willing to help.From the director’s point of view, this is playing it safe until more information or a better chance for working in an interested volunteer presents itself.[2]There is also the cost of a potentially missed opportunity.The combination of making an offer but having it declined would involve a future world where the director and the organization are seen as welcoming, perhaps a slight sting of rejection, still being short of staff, but perhaps help down the road.The director may even have an eye on the ethical principle of nonmaleficence – not causing harm.[1]The final outcome, “Decline” / “No offer” is least inviting.In such a world, one comes across as uncaring, perhaps disorganized, and still short staffed.These outcomes have been presented in what is a plausible rank order from the most to the least attractive future worlds the director would choose to live in.

Now let’s do the analysis of the same four outcomes from the point of view of Mr. Nice.The same combination of strategies does not produce the same outcomes and these are usually not arranged in the same order of preference.[4]But let’s assume that Mr. Nice would be pleased to be accepted as a volunteer.He would feel useful, welcomed, and can take advantage of opportunities to learn about the town.There are altruistic feels as well.Of course he would have less personal time and may have to pass up other opportunities.Perhaps Mr. Nice was hoping for a situation that would take advantage of his management and technical skills. [3]If Mr. Nice volunteers but is not accepted, he will naturally feel slighted, but that can easily be managed by imagining that the director is insensitive, distracted, and a poor judge of character.Mr. Nice does not need the job and is now free to pursue other opportunities.[2]It would have been slightly better from his point of view had the combination of “Offer” / “Decline” been the outcome.That way he feels recognized and yet is free to look for an even better fit.There is the downside of leaving an impression that he is “choosy.”[1]The worst combination is “Declining” “No offer.”That is a waste of time which leaves an impression that either he or the director, and by extension others in town, are inefficient and insensitive.

This is a classic Win-Win engagement where the most desirable outcome is the same combination of actions either way the relationship is viewed.This is listed as Engagement #12 in the Appendix, and the value of the engagement is a maximum possible [8] by almost any moral decision rule.The only plausible reason for not accepting the offer would involve a contrived case where the goal of one or the other agent was contemptuous, with a desire to damage the other for some reason.

Mr. Nice Director

“Accept” “Decline” “Offer” “No offer”

“Offer” [4 4][2 3] “Accept” [4 4][3 2]

Director Mr. Nice

“No offer” [3 2][1 1]“Decline” [2 3][1 1]

Figure 5.1: Alternative framings for an identical Win-Win moral engagement.

Notice that there is no requirement that the agents share a common set of values for solving this problem.In fact, the elements in the framing matrix were entirely personal in each case.They reach a common best future world by harmonizing their own values against the background of each other’s values.There is no need for persuasion or any presumption that they have read the same books on ethical principles.

I have followed here and will urge as a matter of practicality that the engagement matrix always be completed so that [4] appears in the upper left-hand cell for the Row agent. This is merely a convention that has no effect on the outcome.It will turn out, however, that following this practice will make it easier to find tricky rmasolutionsquickly.

The analysis could be switched around to show it from the point of view of Mr. Nice.That would make himthe Row agent.This is shown on the right side of Figure 5.1.No change in optimal mutual strategy happens because of this change, and that is desirable from an ethical perspective.We are looking for the pair of actions that neither party has reason to want to change.Relabeling the rows and columns involves simply moving the pair of numbers in the [square brackets] to the proper new locations.When the agents are switched between row and column, it is also necessary to reverse the left-right order of the preference rankings within the [squarebrackets].Row is always the left-hand value and Column is always the right-hand value.

The analysis of the situation from the rma perspective looks something like this.From the director’s vantage point, the “Offer” strategy is likely to be accepted based on what is expected of Mr. Nice’s view of the world.Therefore the director has no rational or moral reason to act otherwise than to make the offer. She sees that Mr. Nice has no good reason to thwart her intentions.From Mr. Nice’s angle, the strategy leading to the most attractive futureis a willingness to volunteerif invited to do so.That would be consistent with the expectations of both agents.Given the circumstances, neither agent would wish for a different outcome. Neither agent could improve his or her position by switching strategies.So the [4 4], Win-Win,“Offer” /“Volunteer” joint actions is rma.From where both agents stand, the world cannot be made better by any other pair of actions. But caution is necessary: a Win-Win solution is not the same thing as a “perfect” solution. Both the director and Mr. Nice have identified negative features of the framing even for the outcome they prefer. They have minor reservations.Win-Win is the coincidence of the best outcomes, all things considered, not the ideal ones. And “best” only means that all other alternatives have more substantial reservations.

There are a number of complex algorithms for identifying rmain various circumstances, and all of them will be presented in due course.But one simple rule should always be followed:unless you have corrupt motives, never pass up an opportunity for Win-Win.Because Win-Winengagements are so common and are handled so routinely, they are often not even counted among the moral challenges we face.As in the walking example, we can go for hours at a time without realizing that we are routinely, almost subconsciously, solving one moral problem after another using the rma approach.Often we become aware of moral issues only when we sense that Win-Win is not in the cards.Taking the moral good for granted is a dysfunctional bias in human nature: it leads to overestimating the moral burden of society and devalues natural reciprocity among moral agents.We should count all the good as well as the strategically relevant bad.

Next Best

Most of the time nature does not deal the cards exactly evenly to all of us.It is still possible under such circumstances to find and act on rma.

The issue of slavery was hotly debated during the Constitutional Convention of 1787.[2]In the end, the Northern states felt their future as part of an independent country would be more secure with 13 states, some of which were based on a slave economy, while the Southern states placed greater weight on slavery as an institution than on being part of a larger group of states.

We might frame the engagement this way from the Southern point of view: [4] “Union” with “Slavery”: solid economic base, international security, justifiable ethical position, potential conflicts over states’ rights.[3] “Separate” with “Slavery”: solid economy, ethical high ground, political self-determination, but some security and trade drawbacks. [2] “Union” / “No slavery”: security gains but at the cost of a weak economy.[1] “Separate” / “No slavery”: no real advantages.We can enter these framing rank preferences into the moral engagement matrix on the left side of Figure 5.2.

Now we will repeat the process as we imagine the Northern states would have framed the matter. [4] “Union” but “No slavery”: This would make the strongest case for external political stability, but expose internal political conflicts; a case could be made for the moral high ground, both ethically and in terms of actions by other nations at the time. [3] “Union” / “Slavery”: High national security, moral sacrifice, deferred internal political tensions.[2] “Separate” / “No slavery”:This is the unlikely prospect of distinct combinations of states, all of them being slave-free.Had the colonies gone this way, it is possible that England would have reasserted its sovereignty and imposed its own laws which precluded slavery.[1] “Separate” / “Slave”: This outcome would have featured political instability and a surrender of moral principles.The rank preferences of the Northern states are entered as the right-hand numbers in each cell in Figure 5.2.

Next BestBalanced Compromise

NorthernAdministration

“Union” “Separate” “Junk”“Healthy”

]“Slavery”[4 3] [3 1]“Eat in” [4 2] [3 3]

SouthernStudents

“No Slavery”[2 4] [1 2] “Eat out”[2 4] [1 1]

Figure 5.2: Matrices for Next Best and Balanced Compromise engagements.

Both sides claimed ethical justification for their positions, so we would be deadlocked at the ethical level.The North felt the dominant consideration was international security; the South felt the dominant consideration was economic viability.So there was no common ground there.How could any common way forward be found unless one side was forced to capitulate on principles?The reason the Southern states got their way was that they made slave economics a matter of survival while the Northern states saw a united front against Europe as important but not vital.The South had no alternative, but the North did.

The [4 3] joint strategy of union with slavery is a Next Bestrmasolution in this, Engagement #18.That means that the Southern states had no reason to wish for a better outcome by pursuing any other policy, given the economic and political conditions on the ground.They got what they felt they needed by sticking with their demands for slavery and would have expected much less from abandoning their demand.Arma[4 3] was also the best deal available for the Northern states.Had they insisted on no slavery, they could have expected the Southern states to be very lukewarm partners.The British strategy of moving the war to Charleston and the South several years into the War for Independence had been predicated on that reasoning, and it might have worked had not the colonies been disposed to correctly selectNext Best.It is beginning to become clear that moral matters are not always decided on a head-to-head competition between single dominant positions.The overall arrangement matters.It is good to have a robust Plan B: it may offer protection against far worse alternatives.