In my view, the best way to consider morality and determine moral rules is from a game theory perspective. Without getting too in depth with game theory, we can go with a basic example. Consider tic-tac-toe, it’s a very simple game and an optimal strategy is knowable for any give state of the game. As such, it is correct to make a move consistent with the known optimal strategy and incorrect to make one inconsistent. If one always makes the correct move, one is guaranteed to at least tie, and win if the opponent makes a mistake.; if one doesn’t, one forfeits the chance to win, and possibly even the chance to tie, unless the opponent also makes a mistake.
That isn’t very interesting though, because all the possible states are known. So let’s consider a more difficult game, like chess. In this case, we can’t know all possible states, but we do know what the goal state looks like, and we can come up with heuristics that can determine the advantage or disadvantage of various states, then make judgments based upon looking ahead. The best chess players, human or computer, are the ones that have the best combination of heuristics and the ability to calculate potential future moves. This becomes exponentially difficult because each future move has, on average, tens of possible branches.
How this gets interesting, though, is that, in chess, we can’t be ABSOLUTELY sure that the move we’re making is optimal, and sometimes we’re wrong, but we create a system of reasonable moves based upon this structure we’ve calculated with the intention of maximizing our chances of reaching out goal state.
So, how does this relate to morality? Well, it’s not all that unlike chess, except the dimensionality of the state space is massively large, as the number of players and choices are both much larger. The other problem is that there isn’t exactly a set goal state as there is in most games. However, we can still apply similar principles. In short, for a given moral goal, we can then say an act is moral or not moral if, based upon how we might judge a future situation so many moves ahead, that state maximizes our approach toward that goal.
There’s plenty of potential moral goals, and while I personally believe that maximization of freedom is a self-consistent goal from which we can derive most basic moral rules, we can run from pretty much any reasonable moral goal and get the basic moral rules, and this applies to stealing.
In this case, let’s not look just at the consequences of one person stealing from another, but let’s look “several moves ahead”. That is, if I steal from him and he steals from me, and someone else steals from someone else, what does this lead to? This essentially creates a rule about property rights. Now, we could argue the minutiae of what property rights are and are not of value, but I think it reasonably follows that property rights to at least some extent are necessary to a stable society.
Consider it from this perspective. If I agree not to steal from you as long as you agree not to steal from me, aren’t we BOTH better off? And if I have no means of protecting resources I gather, create, or manipulate through my labor, I now lack incentive of putting in that work if I can obtain those resources with less effort by taking them from others.
For example, looking back to our hunter/gatherer days, if it takes days or even just hours to hunt and bring back food, but only minutes to steal a kill, if stealing is allowed, what’s my incentive in investing days or hours to get a kill when I can just take it from someone else? And if everyone realizes and does this, there’s now no incentive for anyone to hunt, and we’re ALL worse off.
Of course, it’s not quite that simple, because people do seem to have moral issues with those who hoard resources. For example, I think most people would say it’s less morally offensive to steal from a large corporation or a rich person than from a small business or middle class or poor person. And, to a certain extent that makes sense, I suppose. But at the same time, someone who hoards resources and doesn’t share is benefiting themselves, potentially at the cost of others, and thus the immorality is on them. Complicating the situation by adding additional immoral actions doesn’t correct the issue. That would be like, in a game, seeing your opponent make a poor move and, rather than furthering the goal, taking a bad move yourself because you now have some leeway in your move set rather than continuing to take the optimal move.
And, yes, in most games all opponents start off on equal footing, but even in some of those, particularly ones that involve chance, some players may end up with an advantage just because of luck. But it’s not just that simple. If I get lucky and get several good rolls of the dice, if I bet on that streak continuing, I’m probably going to get screwed. The best way to play it is to take advantage of those lucky streaks when they show up and then remain prepared for when a bad streak may come.
And this is where the morality of charity comes in. Regardless of one’s moral goals, in most cases, it is lauded to be charitable. Someone who was lucky and born with great talents or money helps those who are less fortunate, because, in the end, we’re ALL better off. But, again, the way to correct that isn’t to act immorally and TAKE it, it’s rather to encourage those people to be charitable.
