I think it doesn’t actually work for the repugnant conclusion—the buttons are supposed to just purely be to the good, and not have to deal with tradeoffs.
Once you start having to deal with tradeoffs, then you get into the aesthetics of population ethics—maybe you want each planet in the galaxy to have a vibrant civilization of happy humans, but past that more happy humans just seems a bit gauche—i.e. there is some value past which the raw marginal utility of cramming more humans into the universe is negative. Any a button promising an existing human extra life might be offered, but these humans are all immortal if they want to be anyhow, and their lives are so good it’s hard to identify one-size-fits-all benefits one could even in theory supply via button, without violating any conservation laws.
All of this is a totally reasonable way to want the future of the universe to be arranged, incompatible with the repugnant conclusion. And still compatible with rejecting the person-affecting view, and pressing the offered buttons in our current circumstances.
I think it doesn’t actually work for the repugnant conclusion—the buttons are supposed to just purely be to the good, and not have to deal with tradeoffs.
Once you start having to deal with tradeoffs, then you get into the aesthetics of population ethics—maybe you want each planet in the galaxy to have a vibrant civilization of happy humans, but past that more happy humans just seems a bit gauche—i.e. there is some value past which the raw marginal utility of cramming more humans into the universe is negative. Any a button promising an existing human extra life might be offered, but these humans are all immortal if they want to be anyhow, and their lives are so good it’s hard to identify one-size-fits-all benefits one could even in theory supply via button, without violating any conservation laws.
All of this is a totally reasonable way to want the future of the universe to be arranged, incompatible with the repugnant conclusion. And still compatible with rejecting the person-affecting view, and pressing the offered buttons in our current circumstances.