Odd, my intuitions are different. Taking the first example:
It feels unfair to value human’s differently based on something as arbitrary as the order in which they are presented to me, or the number of other humans they are standing next to.
If I’m doing something special nobody else is doing and it needs to be done, then I’d better damn well get it done. If I’m standing next to a bunch of other humans doing the same thing, then I’m free! I can leave and nothing especially important happens. I am much less important to the entire enterprise in that case.
If I’m doing something special nobody else is doing and it needs to be done, then I’d better damn well get it done. If I’m standing next to a bunch of other humans doing the same thing, then I’m free! I can leave and nothing especially important happens. I am much less important to the entire enterprise in that case.
The instrumental value of a human may vary from one human to the next. It doesn’t seem to me like this should always go down though, for instance if you have roughly one doctor per every 200 people in you group then each doctor is roughly as instrumentally valuable whether the total number of people is 1 million or 1 billion.
But this is all besides the point, since I personally assign terminal value to humans, independent of any practical use they have (you can’t value everything only instrumentally, trying to do so leads to an infinite regress). I am also inclined to say that except in edge cases, this terminal value is significantly more important than any instrumental value a human may offer.
Coming back to the original discussion we see the following:
The simulations are doing no harm or good to anyone, so their only value is terminal.
The humans on earth are causing untold pain to huge numbers of sentient beings simply by breathing, and may also be doing other things. They have a terminal value, plus a huge negative instrumental value, plus a variety of other positive and negative instrumental values, which average out at not very much.
Yup, you really are on the pro-mass-suicide side of the issue. Whatever. Be sure to pay attention to the proof about bounded utility and figure out which of the premises you disagree with.
Odd, my intuitions are different. Taking the first example:
If I’m doing something special nobody else is doing and it needs to be done, then I’d better damn well get it done. If I’m standing next to a bunch of other humans doing the same thing, then I’m free! I can leave and nothing especially important happens. I am much less important to the entire enterprise in that case.
Be sure to watch the ongoing conversation at
http://lesswrong.com/lw/5te/a_summary_of_savages_foundations_for_probability/
because there’s a plausible axiomatic definition of probability and utility there from which one can apparently prove that utilities are bounded.
The instrumental value of a human may vary from one human to the next. It doesn’t seem to me like this should always go down though, for instance if you have roughly one doctor per every 200 people in you group then each doctor is roughly as instrumentally valuable whether the total number of people is 1 million or 1 billion.
But this is all besides the point, since I personally assign terminal value to humans, independent of any practical use they have (you can’t value everything only instrumentally, trying to do so leads to an infinite regress). I am also inclined to say that except in edge cases, this terminal value is significantly more important than any instrumental value a human may offer.
Coming back to the original discussion we see the following:
The simulations are doing no harm or good to anyone, so their only value is terminal.
The humans on earth are causing untold pain to huge numbers of sentient beings simply by breathing, and may also be doing other things. They have a terminal value, plus a huge negative instrumental value, plus a variety of other positive and negative instrumental values, which average out at not very much.
Yup, you really are on the pro-mass-suicide side of the issue. Whatever. Be sure to pay attention to the proof about bounded utility and figure out which of the premises you disagree with.
For the record, allow me to say that under the vast majority of possible circumstances I am strongly anti-mass-suicide.
To counter your comment, I accuse you of being pro-torture ;)
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Well, it’s good to hear that neither of us are against anything, and are fundamentally positive, up-beat people. :-)
Sounds like a set-up for a debate: “Would you like to take the pro-mass-suicide point of view, or the pro-torture point of view?”