I’d also choose to not exist over the worst suffering for a hundred years—IF I was in my current brain-state. I’d be so insane as to be not-me after just a few minutes or hours if my synapses worked normally and my brain tried to adapt to that state. If I were forced to retain sanity and my character, it would be a harder choice if N got to be more than a hundred times longer.
Regardless, this intuition is just that. It doesn’t show that there’s something fundamentally more important about suffering than pleasure. Just that we’re better at imagining strong suffering than strong pleasure. Which is natural given the evolutionary incentives to focus us on pain.
I definitely didn’t mean to dismiss negative utilitarianism because some of the individuals who believe it seem damaged. I’m skeptical of it because it makes no sense to me, and discussions with NU people don’t help. The most rational among them slide back to negatively-balanced utilitarianism when they’re pressed on details—the FAQ I was pointed to actually does this, written by one of the pillars of the movement. (Negatively balanced means that pleasure does balance pain, but in a very unequal ratio. I think this is right, given our current brain states of representing pleasure much less vividly than pain).
Yes, I’m suggesting that neither you nor I can really imagine prolonged elevated pleasure states. Our current brain setup just doesn’t allow for them, again for evolutionary reasons.
So in sum, I still think pleasure and pain balance out when it comes to decision-making, and it’s just our current evolutionary wiring that makes suffering seem so much bigger than joy.
I’d also choose to not exist over the worst suffering for a hundred years—IF I was in my current brain-state. I’d be so insane as to be not-me after just a few minutes or hours if my synapses worked normally and my brain tried to adapt to that state. If I were forced to retain sanity and my character, it would be a harder choice if N got to be more than a hundred times longer.
Regardless, this intuition is just that. It doesn’t show that there’s something fundamentally more important about suffering than pleasure. Just that we’re better at imagining strong suffering than strong pleasure. Which is natural given the evolutionary incentives to focus us on pain.
I definitely didn’t mean to dismiss negative utilitarianism because some of the individuals who believe it seem damaged. I’m skeptical of it because it makes no sense to me, and discussions with NU people don’t help. The most rational among them slide back to negatively-balanced utilitarianism when they’re pressed on details—the FAQ I was pointed to actually does this, written by one of the pillars of the movement. (Negatively balanced means that pleasure does balance pain, but in a very unequal ratio. I think this is right, given our current brain states of representing pleasure much less vividly than pain).
Yes, I’m suggesting that neither you nor I can really imagine prolonged elevated pleasure states. Our current brain setup just doesn’t allow for them, again for evolutionary reasons.
So in sum, I still think pleasure and pain balance out when it comes to decision-making, and it’s just our current evolutionary wiring that makes suffering seem so much bigger than joy.