Scott Alexander reevaluates Kant's philosophy of universalizability, applying it to modern ethical dilemmas and exploring its relationship with utilitarianism. Longer summary

Scott Alexander revisits Immanuel Kant's philosophy, particularly his concept of universalizability, and finds it more insightful than he previously thought. He reframes Kant's controversial axe murderer example to show how it relates to maintaining the possibility of positive-sum bargains. Scott then applies Kantian principles to modern ethical dilemmas, discussing the challenges in defining and universalizing maxims. He explores the relationship between universalizability and utilitarianism, suggesting that consequentialism might be prior to universalizability, which in turn could be prior to specific versions of utilitarianism. The post ends with an acknowledgment that while these ideas are complex and confusing, they represent a higher level of understanding about important ethical issues. Shorter summary

Mike humorously recounts grounding morality in IHOP's waffles after a meta-ethics discussion, highlighting the challenges in reaching agreement on such topics. Longer summary

This post is a short humorous dialogue between Mike and Alicorn about grounding morality. Mike recounts a past discussion on meta-ethics with a college friend at IHOP, where they jokingly decided to ground morality in waffles after seeing a sign praising IHOP's waffles. The post uses this absurd idea to poke fun at the difficulty of reaching agreement in meta-ethical discussions. Shorter summary