I hope I’m not misunderstanding Hopefully Anonymous’ question here, but it would seem to me that a society whose laws are based solely on rationally minimizing harm would have to be a society with little or no freedom. I guess it depends on what is defined as the maximum risk the society is willing to endure to the physical safety of the individuals (and I presume the structure of the society as a whole). I think Eliezer certainly hinted at what I feel the main problem would be with a society whose laws are made to counteract individual irrationality. In doing so you would have to take away individual choice for the most part. That can be argued as a good thing to a point perhaps. But if you follow the goal of reduction of risk of harm far enough (which it would most certainly be rational to do so if that is your goal) you’d end up in a place where no one can do much of anything because nearly every activity we engage in on a daily basis has some amount of risk associated with it.
Driving a car for example would most certainly have to be done away with then, your risk of serious injury or death is pretty good, and the amount of overall harm to society in terms of wages lost, damage to property, and productive lives lost is quite high. Although I doubt the benefits to the society as a whole of driving would not outweigh the costs, so in such a society perhaps it would be allowed.
I’m not sure I understand how such a system could come about extragovernmentally. Could you elaborate? While social norms certainly appear outside of government influence, laws are a function of government and really only carry weight because the government has the right (or at least ability) to enforce them. For your example of compulsory medical trials (or anything similar to that) I think it would take a very drastic changing of social norms to make such a thing work without a government forcing people to take part in a medical experiments.
I did not mean to write this much at all. But it’s an interesting topic for sure and it’s not one I’m well educated on unfortunately. The above was just my initial reaction to the question.
I hope I’m not misunderstanding Hopefully Anonymous’ question here, but it would seem to me that a society whose laws are based solely on rationally minimizing harm would have to be a society with little or no freedom. I guess it depends on what is defined as the maximum risk the society is willing to endure to the physical safety of the individuals (and I presume the structure of the society as a whole). I think Eliezer certainly hinted at what I feel the main problem would be with a society whose laws are made to counteract individual irrationality. In doing so you would have to take away individual choice for the most part. That can be argued as a good thing to a point perhaps. But if you follow the goal of reduction of risk of harm far enough (which it would most certainly be rational to do so if that is your goal) you’d end up in a place where no one can do much of anything because nearly every activity we engage in on a daily basis has some amount of risk associated with it.
Driving a car for example would most certainly have to be done away with then, your risk of serious injury or death is pretty good, and the amount of overall harm to society in terms of wages lost, damage to property, and productive lives lost is quite high. Although I doubt the benefits to the society as a whole of driving would not outweigh the costs, so in such a society perhaps it would be allowed.
I’m not sure I understand how such a system could come about extragovernmentally. Could you elaborate? While social norms certainly appear outside of government influence, laws are a function of government and really only carry weight because the government has the right (or at least ability) to enforce them. For your example of compulsory medical trials (or anything similar to that) I think it would take a very drastic changing of social norms to make such a thing work without a government forcing people to take part in a medical experiments.
I did not mean to write this much at all. But it’s an interesting topic for sure and it’s not one I’m well educated on unfortunately. The above was just my initial reaction to the question.