Not clear this is the right set of labels. But: goodness and niceness increasingly seem a bit in tension (or at least, not the same thing, I have limited time, etc). What should I do about that?
Concretely:
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Niceness is something like: local goodness, helping the community. Strawmanned: ineffective altruism. Also: cooking meals for your housemates, having slack in your schedule to enable being a back up person, random spontaneous nice things for those round you. Small scale supererogatory reliability. Baking cakes for the christmas fete.
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Goodness is: actually trying, scope sensitivity. Working long hours, impact maximising, setting aside personal interests. Strawmanned: cold and heartless mechanical moves. But it usually involves working hard, optimising your schedule, fitting stuff in. Impact focus. You’re a vessel for good acts to be caused through.
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And virtue is a third thing. One can be virtuous and good, and unvirtuous and nice (though lots of niceness is in virtues). But I mean that e.g. reliability and consistency are not just properties of niceness, but also core to goodness. (And goodness shouldn’t make you a shitty housemate.)
I suppose some questions are: how do you split your time between both? (But I know the answer and think the rest is hand-wringing: you satisfice on niceness, and then aim hard for goodness.) Another question: the character traits both require are different; which should you cultivate? (But that’s the same question in disguise.)
I think I’m feeling bad about not being nicer, even though I do think niceness is supererogatory. (Though maybe my feelings are because I’m worried that I drew the “supererogatory” boundary wrong, and so am worried I’m shirking on the required amount of niceness.)