I don’t think there’s anything wrong with formulating a moral system that can survive the realization that certain animals are intelligent or that aliens exist. I think there’s a good reason to make murder distinct from killing, but “because they are human” is a bad reason to draw moral distinctions. So unless I’m actually talking to “normal people” (instead of a blog of people dedicated to rationality) I don’t see a reason to oversimplify my definitions.
Sorry, I meant it to concentrate more on the “make a contract” with than “human”, and I got the impression that many LWers still would not-killing-babies see as correct.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with formulating a moral system that can survive the realization that certain animals are intelligent or that aliens exist. I think there’s a good reason to make murder distinct from killing, but “because they are human” is a bad reason to draw moral distinctions. So unless I’m actually talking to “normal people” (instead of a blog of people dedicated to rationality) I don’t see a reason to oversimplify my definitions.
Sorry, I meant it to concentrate more on the “make a contract” with than “human”, and I got the impression that many LWers still would not-killing-babies see as correct.