While there’s no particular reason not to go orgasmium, there’s also no particular reason to go there.
We already know that wanting and desiring are expressed by two different, although overlapping, neural circuitries, so it is natural that we may value things that doesn’t directly feedback pleasure.
Let’s say that we find meaningful to be an active part of the world, that we assign a general utility to our actions as they effect the environment: descending into an orgasmium state would kill this effectiveness.
The general argument is that orgasmium can be considered a life of very much low complexity than our present, maybe unboundedly so, and we can, while we’re not forced to, value either the complexity of our present life or complexity per se. This is not akin to say that we value something outside our own state of the mind or saying that, once orgasmium, we would be tempted to opt-out. It means however that the process of turning “myself” into orgasmium, that is depleting complexity for the sake of pleasure, has very, very, very low utility attached to it.
It is possible of course to ask “why do you value complexity?”, “Has this preference any objectively grounded reason?”. I suspect that, even if a future eutopia would cancel all the value we have just because they are instrumental to survival, we would still hold some of those value because that’s how we are wired. There’s no particular reason other than the fact that those values are essentially what makes us human (not in a general sens, my values are what makes me human, your values are what makes you human, etc). If we do not accept this point of view, then orgasmium becomes just as viable as pleasure asymbolia, dronization and suicide (that is, descent to complexity 0).
Ceteribus paribus yes, of course, but not if “achieve maximum pleasure” violates some moral code or drastically diminishes something else you might value, as could be in the case of orgasmium collapse.
While there’s no particular reason not to go orgasmium, there’s also no particular reason to go there.
We already know that wanting and desiring are expressed by two different, although overlapping, neural circuitries, so it is natural that we may value things that doesn’t directly feedback pleasure. Let’s say that we find meaningful to be an active part of the world, that we assign a general utility to our actions as they effect the environment: descending into an orgasmium state would kill this effectiveness.
The general argument is that orgasmium can be considered a life of very much low complexity than our present, maybe unboundedly so, and we can, while we’re not forced to, value either the complexity of our present life or complexity per se. This is not akin to say that we value something outside our own state of the mind or saying that, once orgasmium, we would be tempted to opt-out. It means however that the process of turning “myself” into orgasmium, that is depleting complexity for the sake of pleasure, has very, very, very low utility attached to it.
It is possible of course to ask “why do you value complexity?”, “Has this preference any objectively grounded reason?”. I suspect that, even if a future eutopia would cancel all the value we have just because they are instrumental to survival, we would still hold some of those value because that’s how we are wired. There’s no particular reason other than the fact that those values are essentially what makes us human (not in a general sens, my values are what makes me human, your values are what makes you human, etc). If we do not accept this point of view, then orgasmium becomes just as viable as pleasure asymbolia, dronization and suicide (that is, descent to complexity 0).
In the choice between “some control over reality” and “maximum pleasure,” it seems to me that “maximum pleasure” comes highly recommended.
Ceteribus paribus yes, of course, but not if “achieve maximum pleasure” violates some moral code or drastically diminishes something else you might value, as could be in the case of orgasmium collapse.
I commented that because your first sentence seemed odd- there may be no one reason to not go orgasmium, but there’s only one reason to go orgasmium.