trinite0 t1_iwha8qc wrote
From the article:
>If we accept the reality of experience, it’s hard to deny that the universe has value built in. The good must derive from reducing suffering and promoting bliss, every coherent conception of it must ultimately point to this fact. If we buy the self-evident fact that conscious valence is real, we get an ought from an is.
>
>Given this strong argument for moral realism, I find it hard to imagine an ultimate ethical theory that isn’t based on some form of utilitarianism. Deontological and virtue ethics may provide good tools for achieving good outcomes, but they don’t get to the heart of the matter. Any coherent ethical theory must aim to attain a world-state with less suffering. This ultimately reduces to a form of utilitarianism that is based on measuring the quality of conscious experience, often referred to as valence utilitarianism.1
So the argument here is: if you accept the premise that utilitarianism is the only option, then you must conclude that utilitarianism is the only option.
Okay then.
eliyah23rd t1_iwhqujt wrote
My problem is more in the first paragraph you quoted.
>If we buy the self-evident fact that conscious valence is real, we get an ought from an is.
Nope. Nice paragraph but it's not an argument.
Yes I feel that valence for myself. It so happens I even want to end suffering for others. But that still doesn't tell me why I should want to end suffering for others.
I'm afraid I'm going to have to remain in the moral skeptic camp.
Squark09 OP t1_iwib1es wrote
If you can believe suffering is objectively bad and that other people can suffer, then you get the should. It's almost tautological based on the definition of bad
clairelecric t1_iwk69vs wrote
But it's not objectively bad it's subjectively bad
phenamen t1_iwnxi1u wrote
It's bad for any subject, therefore it's objectively bad insofar as subjectivity exists
clairelecric t1_iwoajb4 wrote
That doesn't follow logically at all. For instance, it is mostly bad from the perspective of said subject, but maybe not from a different perspective. Also, suffering can be an important signal to ourselves that something is amiss. So you might say "but then we try to solve the suffering so then we prove that suffering is bad because we want to get rid of it". Well, you could argue that, but you could also argue that without the suffering we wouldn't change for the better. The suffering is a means to an end. Without it we wouldn't know there was some kind of (subjective) problem.
phenamen t1_iwoilxr wrote
You're absolutely right about the counterargument that I'm going to make but I don't think that your rebuttal is sound. How else can we understand "change for the better" except as creating personal habits or relationships which more consistently produce happiness than suffering?
clairelecric t1_iwoy9fz wrote
Surely you see that many of our ideas of better or worse are constructions? For the person seeking enlightenment going into refuge and isolation is better. For someone else it might be getting more friends. For another it's faith in God.
Let's say there's an alien species looking at us and considering us detrimental to the planet and potentially our solar system. Let's say they look at our self destruction with joy and a sense of justice. Does that possibility not prove there is no objective bad?
iiioiia t1_iwiaq5g wrote
> But that still doesn't tell me why I should want to end suffering for others.
Arguably it may decrease the likelihood of people harming other people due to anger as a consequence of their suffering...and some day, one of those harmed people could be you or one of your loved ones.
eliyah23rd t1_iwm74l9 wrote
Hi. Your reply is a factual argument about how best to implement my own preference.
Value. I don't want to suffer. Fact. Letting others suffer increases the chances that they will make you suffer. Plan. Decrease their suffering.
I called it a value here. But it is a preference. There is no argument here that I "should" hold to that preference. There is just the description that I do. I could just as easily be a masochist. I know that I have Neural modules that implement Motivational Salience but that is just a fancy way of saying that I do what I want to do.
Again, moral skepticism does not imply that I prefer only survival or my own pleasure (though advertisers have an interest in my thinking that.) I could just prefer helping other people. I get a real buzz when I prevent suffering. Is that a "value"?
iiioiia t1_iwmigm3 wrote
I was coming at it from the perspective that most people tend to prefer not being killed (or dying in general).
Considering that: did you get vaccinated for COVID?
eliyah23rd t1_iwmk9bd wrote
>Considering that: did you get vaccinated for COVID?
why?
iiioiia t1_iwml78f wrote
It may provide insight into your stance on staying alive (that may be contrary to your self-perceptions on it, at times).
eliyah23rd t1_iwp3p4z wrote
I'm not sure it would.
In your mind (I assume), I am a disembodied online persona. There is no evidence that the sufficient cause of these words is an actual human being.
Say, I claim that the person causing this persona had received 5 shots but that the person spent time every day with their 97-old parent. They express concern that becoming infected might endanger their parent's life. That person's brain would seem to have some Neurons that achieve motivational salience that associate looking after the welfare of a parent as a high-priority value. Say an advanced fMRI could confirm this description.
What would that tell you about what you or anyone else in the world "should" do?
iiioiia t1_iwqajxu wrote
I think this is a plausible edge case - you could even be suicidal, yet get vaccinated to protect a loved one.
But I don't think this necessarily reaches a "should", as simple preference could be sufficient. In a sense, from certain perspectives, maybe "should' is purely a collective hallucination, like "rights", most of "truth", etc. Adult life is very much like a continuation of "playing house" from childhood.
eliyah23rd t1_iwqe368 wrote
Wow! Exactly!
I just did a few posts on the idea of ethics as a game on the Instagram link. Check out the comments where I expand on the aphorism.
iiioiia t1_iwqegwu wrote
> ethics as a game
This sounds interesting....but can you link to what you're referring to?
eliyah23rd t1_iwqic63 wrote
Sure
https://www.instagram.com/eliyah23rd/
See the last two posts. I am struggling to upload a third but Instagram seems to be having some issue.
iiioiia t1_iwqj07t wrote
Ah, I think we've talked about this before right? As a fan of subversion: some of those are excellent.
Now we just need an implementation.
eliyah23rd t1_iwqjtpn wrote
Thank you so much.
Yes, we have spoken about it before.
I need collaborators for an implementation. Also more criticism of the core ideas.
That's why I hang out trying to talk to people.
iiioiia t1_iwqrori wrote
What sort of an implementation do you have in mind?
eliyah23rd t1_iwqyyo8 wrote
Rather than pour too many words on to the page, can I refer to the comment/caption in these posts:
https://www.instagram.com/p/Cj4_NgYsxUw/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CkIg-UkMbhw/
https://www.instagram.com/p/CkNx6RkMvQo/
I try to put a lot of the details directly in the description
iiioiia t1_iwqzoo9 wrote
You are onto something.
eliyah23rd t1_iwr2f4v wrote
Thank you so much.
iiioiia t1_iwr36b0 wrote
If you ever come into some $$$, let me know, and I will do likewise. :)
eliyah23rd t1_iwu93ag wrote
I'm not trying to get $$$
I believe in collaboration instead.
Look at the open source movement. They produce far superior code to that of all the big corporations with budgets in the billions. Yes, some corporations hire teams of independent minded open source creators and exploit them IMO because they control the real gold: eyeballs and data.
I want to work without being tied to $$. I want to find the first collaborators and roll on from there.
:heart: > $
iiioiia t1_iwuupck wrote
> I'm not trying to get $$$
Why not? What kind of an implementation are you aiming at that wouldn't benefit from $$$?
> I believe in collaboration instead.
They are not mutually exclusive....like not at all. In fact, the opposite is more often true (consider the website we are having this conversation on right now, which runs on money).
> Look at the open source movement. They produce far superior code to that of all the big corporations with budgets in the billions. Yes, some corporations hire teams of independent minded open source creators and exploit them IMO because they control the real gold: eyeballs and data.
True....but if one wants to reach a goal, which is (probabilistically) faster: hoping for talent, or buying talent?
> I want to work without being tied to $$. I want to find the first collaborators and roll on from there.
Money tends to tie/corrupt people, but it is not a necessity.
> :heart: > $
Exactly. But that does not render the value/power of money to be zero. Both variables could be extremely large numbers, with heart being a much bigger large number.
As a though experiment, imagine two scenarios:
a) You and me (as is) vs the world ("the powers that be")
b) You and me (with unrestricted access to $45B in capital) vs the world ("the powers that be")
If it was me, I'd choose option (b).
eliyah23rd t1_ix45dij wrote
I am not against other people raising money for a cause. I am not interested in raising money. I don't want to be controlled by the wishes of those who give the money nor am I interested in buying talent and telling other people what I want them to create.
I just want to inspire, be corrected by and collaborate with other people who are trying to achieve the same goal. If we have differing goals but can find some goals in common, then that is fantastic too. If one or more of the team wants to raise money to further the ideas we've worked on, that would be great. It is just not the role I want.
That may all change. For now, I just want to create a forum where people who care can discuss the issues. I've got some ideas and these ideas need criticism. I want to hear the ideas other people have. Once there's some momentum, let's see where we all want to go from there.
sener87 t1_iwhnviz wrote
You have a typo there, the end should be Q.E.D.
Squark09 OP t1_iwiajr8 wrote
If you accept the premise that experience with positive or negative valence is real and that closed individualism is false, utilitarianism is the only option.
I guess most people have more issue with the closed individualism part
trinite0 t1_iwie922 wrote
That conclusion absolutely does not follow from those premises, and the article makes no coherent argument that it does. It smuggles its conclusion into the premises themselves, and asserts it with no argument.
Squark09 OP t1_iwij01g wrote
It seems like the conclusion is smuggled in because in a way it's tautological. What we mean by good or bad has to be conveyed by conscious valence, as that's the only way we can know anything.
Then if you reject closed individualism, you have to admit that other people's experiences matter as well.
Hence you get valence utilitarianism.
trinite0 t1_iwijwfc wrote
A tautology is not an argument. It does not have a conclusion.
Squark09 OP t1_iwikbdg wrote
Although pointing out tautologies can clear up confusion.
What do you mean by good or bad?
trinite0 t1_iwikhiz wrote
"Good or bad" what? In what context?
Squark09 OP t1_iwioe5t wrote
In the context of ethics
trinite0 t1_iwiqlwd wrote
"Ethics" is not a meaningful context.
I assume you mean something like, "How do I assign value to experiences in the course of making choices between different possible courses of action?"
And I'll answer for myself, but with what I think applies to every human being: "Poorly, inconsistently, intuitively, and with very little reflection, reasoning, or conscious judgment in 99.9% of cases."
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