Uploaded July 2022 | Updated September 2026, 2 days ago
I'm joined by Matthew Adelstein of Deliberation Under Ideal Conditions for Utilitarianism 101. We also talk about a few basic things everyone needs to know to be conversant in moral philosophy.
Matthew's channel: youtube.com/channel/UCgMYs1CgxkXy2KStHTvA9UA
Bentham's Bulldog: benthams.substack.com
Support the podcast(s):
patreon.com/counter
patreon.com/waldenpod
Linktree: https://linktr.ee/emersongreen
/ Timestamps /
00:00 Opening thoughts
03:32 Moral Philosophy: A few things you should know
08:17 Comparing Consequentialism, Deontology, Virtue Ethics
27:23 The moral track record of utilitarians
29:42 Objection 1: Framing innocents
44:28 Audience Qs: Thought Experiments, Objective List
52:05 Objection 2: Organ harvesting
1:08:20 Objection 3: Promises to dead people
1:13:30 Impartiality & Agent-neutrality
1:22:20 Audience Qs
1:33:47 A trillion minor irritations vs. torture
1:44:52 Utility monsters
1:56:01 Objection 4: The electrical accident
2:05:08 Is it immoral to spread utilitarian thinking?
2:08:03 Don't push the fat man
2:09:23 Objection 5: Cookies for Mother Teresa (plus some stuff about prisons)
2:19:34 Board Games
2:23:55 How can utilitarians resolve disagreements?
2:33:39 Classifying utilitarian theories
2:51:34 Emerson's low-effort pluralism (zero bullets to bite)
I'm joined by Matthew Adelstein of Deliberation Under Ideal Conditions for Utilitarianism 101. We also talk about a few basic things everyone needs to know to be conversant in moral philosophy.
Matthew's channel: youtube.com/channel/UCgMYs1CgxkXy2KStHTvA9UA
Bentham's Bulldog: benthams.substack.com
Support the podcast(s):
patreon.com/counter
patreon.com/waldenpod
Linktree: https://linktr.ee/emersongreen
/ Timestamps /
00:00 Opening thoughts
03:32 Moral Philosophy: A few things you should know
08:17 Comparing Consequentialism, Deontology, Virtue Ethics
27:23 The moral track record of utilitarians
29:42 Objection 1: Framing innocents
44:28 Audience Qs: Thought Experiments, Objective List
52:05 Objection 2: Organ harvesting
1:08:20 Objection 3: Promises to dead people
1:13:30 Impartiality & Agent-neutrality
1:22:20 Audience Qs
1:33:47 A trillion minor irritations vs. torture
1:44:52 Utility monsters
1:56:01 Objection 4: The electrical accident
2:05:08 Is it immoral to spread utilitarian thinking?
2:08:03 Don't push the fat man
2:09:23 Objection 5: Cookies for Mother Teresa (plus some stuff about prisons)
2:19:34 Board Games
2:23:55 How can utilitarians resolve disagreements?
2:33:39 Classifying utilitarian theories
2:51:34 Emerson's low-effort pluralism (zero bullets to bite)
![Why I dont care about logical fallacies [Full Podcast Episode]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/p4wDWMzvkA0/mqdefault.jpg "Why I dont care about logical fallacies [Full Podcast Episode]
Take a look at nearly any book on critical thinking and you’ll come across a list of fallacies: ad hominem, argument from ignorance, appeal to emotion, appeal to authority, post hoc ergo propter hoc, god of the gaps, and so on. The problem is that many of these “fallacies” closely resemble good lines of reasoning. Overreliance on fallacy lists – common practice in the skeptic community – fosters shallow criticism, distracts from the substance of an issue, and doesn’t even accomplish the ostensible purpose of demarcating good and bad reasoning.
I’m hard on skeptics in this episode, but that’s because I used to lean on this crutch myself. Over time, the usefulness of this approach struck me as less and less credible, and talk about fallacies tapered off. Fortunately, philosophers like Maarten Boudry and Michael Huemer, whose work you can find below, explained in clear terms what is so unhelpful about this mode of thinking. “Fallacy theory,” as Boudry calls it, is only one feature of a shallow, facile mode of philosophizing, one which isn’t very conducive to a genuine search for truth. I would suggest that one way of improving the quality of our discourse would be to lay off the fallacy accusations a bit. It would lead to a more fruitful search for knowledge and understanding.
After the first five minutes or so of big picture criticism, the bulk of the episode is dedicated to concrete examples, focusing on the ad hominem fallacy, ad populum, “correlation does not imply causation” – the post hoc ergo propter hoc (or cum hoc) fallacy – and begging the question.
https://linktr.ee/emersongreen
The Fallacy Fork: Why It’s Time to Get Rid of Fallacy Theory - Maarten Boudry https://maartenboudry.be/2017/06/the-fallacy-fork-why-its-time-to-get.html
Playing Fallacy “Gotcha!” - Maarten Boudry https://maartenboudry.be/2018/01/playing-fallacy-gotcha.html
Knowledge, Reality, and Value: A Mostly Common Sense Guide to Philosophy - Michael Huemer https://www.amazon.com/Knowledge-Reality-Value-Mostly-Philosophy/dp/B091F5QTDS
The Fake, the Flimsy, and the Fallacious: Demarcating Arguments in Real Life - Maarten Boudry, Fabio Paglieri & Massimo Pigliucci https://philpapers.org/rec/BOUTFT
Twitter @waldenpod
Transcript https://emersongreenblog.wordpress.com/2022/04/21/logical-fallacies/
/ Counter Apologetics /
Consider supporting at https://www.patreon.com/counter
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/counter-apologetics/id1273573417
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0xp05xgyg04BWh0U1tCZ0z
/ Walden Pod /
Consider supporting at https://www.patreon.com/waldenpod
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/walden-pod/id1474408172
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5It3kjkrB9CTDen1Sx3aGl?si=fZ6MENZ4TdSLDPLAJ_6dAA&nd=1
/ Timestamps /
00:00 Introduction & the Big Picture
05:31 Post hoc ergo propter hoc
07:36 ad hominem
16:36 ad populum
19:19 Begging the question
23:27 Conclusion")
