I agree that N need not equal 2. But I think a lot of people seem to think so. Why? Because whenever the Mere Addition Paradox is brought up no one suggests that the inhabitants of A ought to kill the extra people added in A+, take their stuff, and use it to enrich their own lives.
That does not follow. For a total utilitarian, there should exist values of “barely worth living” and “excellent” such that N>2, but it is not true that the people with excellent lives (henceforth: “rich people”) killing the people with lives barely worth living (henceforth: “poor people”) and taking their resources would increase utility (the poor people’s resources might provide negligible marginal utility for the rich people). Thus, the proposition that the rich people killing the poor people and taking their resources would decrease utility does not prove that the lives of 2 poor people together have higher utility than the lives of 1 rich person.
If there is some other reason why everyone agrees it’s wrong to kill the people in A+ please let me know.
I’m having trouble following your intuition that the rich people killing the poor people to take their stuff would be likely to increase utility in naive utilitarian reasoning. This is the best argument that I could think of: “It presumably takes some positive amount of resources even to get someone’s life to the point where it is just as good as if the person didn’t exist, and that positive amount of resources would do a certain positive amount of good in the hands of the rich people. Thus, there should exist some quality of life that is worth living if the resources would otherwise go to waste, but not if the resources would otherwise go to someone else.” Is that roughly what you were thinking? If so, Eliezer explains why that does not imply you should kill them and take their resources in the forth paragraph of The Lifespan Dilemma
the poor people’s resources might provide negligible marginal utility for the rich people
That would likely be true in the first step with the rich people of “A.” But after the first step is complete the idea is to repeat it over and over, with the inhabitants getting progressively impoverished, until one gets to population “Z” where everyone’s life is barely worth living. Is there no step where the newly added poor people’s resources might provide greater utility for, the previous inhabitants. For instance, could the slightly less poor people in existing population X gain utility by killing the newly added poor people in “X+”?
Is that roughly what you were thinking?
Yes.
If so, Eliezer explains why that does not imply you should kill them and take their resources in the forth paragraph of The Lifespan Dilemma
That is true and I agree with his reasoning. However, Eliezer is not a naive utilitarian, he seems to believe in complex, multifaceted values, of the type that I am advocating. My claim is that a naive utilitarian might hold such a belief.
That would likely be true in the first step with the rich people of “A.” But after the first step is complete the idea is to repeat it over and over, with the inhabitants getting progressively impoverished, until one gets to population “Z” where everyone’s life is barely worth living. Is there no step where the newly added poor people’s resources might provide greater utility for, the previous inhabitants. For instance, could the slightly less poor people in existing population X gain utility by killing the newly added poor people in “X+”?
I said that there is likely to exist some values for “barely worth living” and “excellent” such that N>2 but it decreases utility for the rich people to kill the poor and take their resources. Pointing out that this is likely not to be true for all values for “barely worth living” and “excellent” such that N>2 does not refute my proof. I don’t get where this N=2 thing came from. (lol, if this thread continues too much longer, we’ll have to explain to the FBI why our statements that appeared to be calling for the murder of poor people were taken completely out of context.)
My claim is that a naive utilitarian might hold such a belief.
Okay, a naive utilitarian who doesn’t see a difference between a person worth creating and a person worth not destroying would probably think doing that would have higher utility than doing nothing, and might think that it is better than distributing the resources evenly in certain situations. Where were we going with this?
It occurred to me when I was going through the MAP and had the thought “wait, why are we assuming that adding the new people and sharing with them always generates more utility, why are we assuming the amount of utility the people in A lose by sharing with A+ is always exceeded by the amount the people in A+ gain?” Then I realized that it was because if we ever assume otherwise than killing the new people would become acceptable, which is obviously wrong. Since then I’ve considered it an implicit assumption of MAP.
Where were we going with this?
I was trying to say that a more complex, multifaceted theory of ethics, such as the one I propose, is necessary to avoid various frightful implication of more simplified ethics.
wait, why are we assuming that adding the new people and sharing with them always generates more utility, why are we assuming the amount of utility the people in A lose by sharing with A+ is always exceeded by the amount the people in A+ gain?
Right, going from A+ to B might require increasing the amount of resources available if it has to avoid decreasing total utility, and if it does, then you can’t derive the repugnant conclusion as an actual policy recommendation. Although diminishing marginal returns suggests that going from A+ to B usually will not require adding resources, but going from A to A+ will. [Edit: I was about to add a link to a post explaining this in more detail, but then I realized that you wrote it, so I guess you understand that]
Edit2: And you still haven’t answered my question. Why N=2?
I was trying to say that a more complex, multifaceted theory of ethics, such as the one I propose, is necessary to avoid various frightful implication of more simplified ethics.
Forget “a naive utilitarian who doesn’t … might …”. If there are a bunch of people whose lives are so terrible that it would almost be better for them to kill them out of mercy, but not quite, and keeping them alive takes a lot of resources that could be very useful to others, I would endorse killing them, and I find that fairly intuitive. Do you disagree?
Edit2: And you still haven’t answered my question. Why N=2?
I thought that N would have to equal 2 in order for the math to work out when claiming that going from A+ to B would always increase utility. It seems like otherwise you’d reach a point where it would lower utility to take wealth from A and give it to A+. But you’ve convinced me that my math might be off.
If there are a bunch of people whose lives are so terrible that it would almost be better for them to kill them out of mercy, but not quite, and keeping them alive takes a lot of resources that could be very useful to others, I would endorse killing them, and I find that fairly intuitive.
I suppose if you put it that way. I think for me it would depend a lot on how wealthy the rest of society is, perhaps because I have prioritarian sympathies. But I can’t say in principle that there aren’t instances where it would be acceptable.
That does not follow. For a total utilitarian, there should exist values of “barely worth living” and “excellent” such that N>2, but it is not true that the people with excellent lives (henceforth: “rich people”) killing the people with lives barely worth living (henceforth: “poor people”) and taking their resources would increase utility (the poor people’s resources might provide negligible marginal utility for the rich people). Thus, the proposition that the rich people killing the poor people and taking their resources would decrease utility does not prove that the lives of 2 poor people together have higher utility than the lives of 1 rich person.
I’m having trouble following your intuition that the rich people killing the poor people to take their stuff would be likely to increase utility in naive utilitarian reasoning. This is the best argument that I could think of: “It presumably takes some positive amount of resources even to get someone’s life to the point where it is just as good as if the person didn’t exist, and that positive amount of resources would do a certain positive amount of good in the hands of the rich people. Thus, there should exist some quality of life that is worth living if the resources would otherwise go to waste, but not if the resources would otherwise go to someone else.” Is that roughly what you were thinking? If so, Eliezer explains why that does not imply you should kill them and take their resources in the forth paragraph of The Lifespan Dilemma
That would likely be true in the first step with the rich people of “A.” But after the first step is complete the idea is to repeat it over and over, with the inhabitants getting progressively impoverished, until one gets to population “Z” where everyone’s life is barely worth living. Is there no step where the newly added poor people’s resources might provide greater utility for, the previous inhabitants. For instance, could the slightly less poor people in existing population X gain utility by killing the newly added poor people in “X+”?
Yes.
That is true and I agree with his reasoning. However, Eliezer is not a naive utilitarian, he seems to believe in complex, multifaceted values, of the type that I am advocating. My claim is that a naive utilitarian might hold such a belief.
I said that there is likely to exist some values for “barely worth living” and “excellent” such that N>2 but it decreases utility for the rich people to kill the poor and take their resources. Pointing out that this is likely not to be true for all values for “barely worth living” and “excellent” such that N>2 does not refute my proof. I don’t get where this N=2 thing came from. (lol, if this thread continues too much longer, we’ll have to explain to the FBI why our statements that appeared to be calling for the murder of poor people were taken completely out of context.)
Okay, a naive utilitarian who doesn’t see a difference between a person worth creating and a person worth not destroying would probably think doing that would have higher utility than doing nothing, and might think that it is better than distributing the resources evenly in certain situations. Where were we going with this?
It occurred to me when I was going through the MAP and had the thought “wait, why are we assuming that adding the new people and sharing with them always generates more utility, why are we assuming the amount of utility the people in A lose by sharing with A+ is always exceeded by the amount the people in A+ gain?” Then I realized that it was because if we ever assume otherwise than killing the new people would become acceptable, which is obviously wrong. Since then I’ve considered it an implicit assumption of MAP.
I was trying to say that a more complex, multifaceted theory of ethics, such as the one I propose, is necessary to avoid various frightful implication of more simplified ethics.
Right, going from A+ to B might require increasing the amount of resources available if it has to avoid decreasing total utility, and if it does, then you can’t derive the repugnant conclusion as an actual policy recommendation. Although diminishing marginal returns suggests that going from A+ to B usually will not require adding resources, but going from A to A+ will. [Edit: I was about to add a link to a post explaining this in more detail, but then I realized that you wrote it, so I guess you understand that]
Edit2: And you still haven’t answered my question. Why N=2?
Forget “a naive utilitarian who doesn’t … might …”. If there are a bunch of people whose lives are so terrible that it would almost be better for them to kill them out of mercy, but not quite, and keeping them alive takes a lot of resources that could be very useful to others, I would endorse killing them, and I find that fairly intuitive. Do you disagree?
I thought that N would have to equal 2 in order for the math to work out when claiming that going from A+ to B would always increase utility. It seems like otherwise you’d reach a point where it would lower utility to take wealth from A and give it to A+. But you’ve convinced me that my math might be off.
I think that I might have made the N=2 conclusion before I reached the “adding resources is neccessary conclusion” you alluded to earlier, and that it persisted as a cached thought even though my newer ideas made it obsolete.
I suppose if you put it that way. I think for me it would depend a lot on how wealthy the rest of society is, perhaps because I have prioritarian sympathies. But I can’t say in principle that there aren’t instances where it would be acceptable.