Karnofsky has, as far as I know, not endorsed measures of charitable effectiveness that discount the utility of potential people.
Actually, according to this transcript on page four, Holden finds that the claim that the value of creating a life is “some reasonable” ratio of the value of saving a current life is very questionable. More exactly, the transcript sad:
Holden: So there is this hypothesis that the far future is worth n lives and
this causing this far future to exist is as good as saving n lives.
That I meant to state as an accurate characterization of someone
else’s view.
Eliezer: So I was about to say that it’s not my view that causing a life to
exist is on equal value of saving the life.
Holden: But it’s some reasonable multiplier.
Eliezer: But it’s some reasonable multiplier, yes. It’s not an order of
magnitude worse.
Holden: Right. I’m happy to modify it that way, and still say that I think
this is a very questionable hypothesis, but that I’m willing to
accept it for the sake of argument for a little bit. So yeah, then
my rejoinder, as like a parenthetical, which is not meant to pass
any Ideological Turing Test, it’s just me saying what I think, is
that this is very speculative, that it’s guessing at the number of
lives we’re going to have, and it’s also very debatable that you
should even be using the framework of applying a multiplier to
lives allowed versus lives saved. So I don’t know that that’s the
most productive discussion, it’s a philosophy discussion, often
philosophy discussions are not the most productive discussions
in my view.
Actually, according to this transcript on page four, Holden finds that the claim that the value of creating a life is “some reasonable” ratio of the value of saving a current life is very questionable. More exactly, the transcript sad: