Yeah, that’s probably right. But notice that even in that case, unlike the utilitarian, there are no thorny issues about how to deal with non-human agents. If we run into an alien that has a serious preference for raping humans, the utilitarian only has ad-hoc ways of deciding whether or not the alien’s preference counts. Eliezer’s metaethics handles it elegantly: check your utility function. Of course, that’s easier said than done in the real world, but it does solve many philosophical problems associated with utilitarianism.
Yeah, that’s probably right. But notice that even in that case, unlike the utilitarian, there are no thorny issues about how to deal with non-human agents. If we run into an alien that has a serious preference for raping humans, the utilitarian only has ad-hoc ways of deciding whether or not the alien’s preference counts. Eliezer’s metaethics handles it elegantly: check your utility function. Of course, that’s easier said than done in the real world, but it does solve many philosophical problems associated with utilitarianism.