I don’t think your counterexamples accurately state a scenario or apply kpreid’s reasoning correctly:
There’s no reason to alleviate the pain of people who are incapacitated (eg bedridden hospital patients, people undergoing surgery) because they wouldn’t be accomplishing any goals anyway.
He was clear that the pain in surgery conveys no new information. Plus, the bedridden can clearly accomplish some goals.
There’s no reason to care if a person with no goals or bad goals is in pain.
In this context, it’s not really possible for someone not to have goals. They might not explicitly be able to state long-term goals, but as long as they’re taking deliberate actions, they have goals. And yes, for sufficiently bad goals, you do care how hard it is for the person to carry them out!
There’s no reason to care about low levels of pain that don’t prevent someone from achieving a goal.
The standard is hindrance, not prevention, and any level of pain will hinder, or you will not identify it as pain.
He was clear that the pain in surgery conveys no new information.
Let me try to explain this better, then. Imagine we take a person who needs surgery but was never told by their doctor what part of their body the surgery will be on. We perform the surgery without any anaesthetic and with the patient blindfolded. In this case, the pain is giving new information (“AAAIE! MY RIGHT LEG!”) but we still don’t approve.
kpreid could clarify that this information is useless (in that the patient doesn’t gain anything from knowing) and that (s)he meant useful information. But this isn’t true either. I could state before the surgery that I will give the patient ten cents if they can tell me which of their limbs I operated on, but this still wouldn’t make it okay to perform surgery without anaesthetic.
The way I would have put kpreid’s point is that the pain must provide sufficiently useful information to offset its painfulness. If putting someone under surgery without anaesthetic earned someone ten cents, I would consider it an atrocity, but if it was necessary so that the patient could help guide the surgeon by telling them what they feel, saving the patient’s life, then it might be a necessary measure.
However, this seems like straightforward utilitarianism, in which the benefit of getting information must outweigh the cost of having such terrible pain. This means it can’t be used as a definition of why pain is a cost.
I would say that pain is a cost for other reasons, but that when pain conveys information, the information can be a counterbalancing factor. This makes it a mistake to say that the reason pain is a cost is that it doesn’t convey information, equivalent to saying that the reason bombing civilians in Afghanistan is bad is that it doesn’t kill Osama bin Laden. The reason bombing civilians is bad is because murder is wrong. Killing Osama bin Laden would be a potential counterbalancing factor that might justify bombing the civilians, but lack of Osama-killing is not the definition of the evil of murder.
In this context, it’s not really possible for someone not to have goals. They might not explicitly be able to state long-term goals, but as long as they’re taking deliberate actions, they have goals. And yes, for sufficiently bad goals, you do care how hard it is for the person to carry them out!
Consider someone whose only ambition is to collect every Pokemon in the world. Kpreid’s scenario suggests a dichotomy: either it is okay to cause this person pain, or the only reason not to cause this person pain is because it might prevent Pokemons from being collected. I don’t think this captures the reason we don’t break the bones of Pokemon collectors (even though we all feel sorely tempted sometimes.)
Without commenting on the rest of your comment, I would like to clarify a point:
Let me try to explain this better, then. Imagine we take a person who needs surgery but was never told by their doctor what part of their body the surgery will be on. We perform the surgery without any anaesthetic and with the patient blindfolded. In this case, the pain is giving new information (“AAAIE! MY RIGHT LEG!”) but we still don’t approve.
The first little twinge (also, mechanical sensation that is not pain) in any given spot tells them what’s going on and is useful. The rest of it that sums up to “AAAIE!” is useless-and-therefore-bad.
Also, it’s common for someone to not want to know what’s going on; they would prefer, not just the absence of pain, but any sensation, any information from the body part(s) involved; this is reasonable and, I would argue, a separate module from the badness of (some) pain.
Consider someone whose only ambition is to collect every Pokemon in the world. Kpreid’s scenario suggests a dichotomy: either it is okay to cause this person pain, or the only reason not to cause this person pain is because it might prevent Pokemons from being collected.
I would agree with this statement. This person’s ambition does not involve not having pain; they would gladly be tortured for six years if that were the most efficient way of getting one more Pokemon.
Does “not having pain” count as an ambition? If so, then probably anything we like or dislike can be described as ambition or goal, and “pain interferes with our goals” reduces to liitle more than “we don’t like pain”.
Well, “ambition” isn’t much of a word for it, seeing as how it isn’t very ambitious. But yes, I think that we can generally describe our likes and dislikes as goals, in which case not liking pain very much makes pain interfere with our goals.
I would say that pain is a cost for other reasons, but that when pain conveys information, the information can be a counterbalancing factor. This makes it a mistake to say that the reason pain is a cost is that it doesn’t convey information, equivalent to saying that the reason bombing civilians in Afghanistan is bad is that it doesn’t kill Osama bin Laden. The reason bombing civilians is bad is because murder is wrong. Killing Osama bin Laden would be a potential counterbalancing factor that might justify bombing the civilians, but lack of Osama-killing is not the definition of the evil of murder.
Good point; I wasn’t careful to distinguish between a “benefit” and an “outweighed cost”. However, as I mentioned in another comment, akrasia can blur the distinction. For example, what if pain causes me to take the necessary action against a minor health problem before it becomes a major problem, when otherwise I’d procrastinate? My future self would be very thankful.
Yet you cannot view the pain as some add-on attribute here. The displeasure is part of its usefulness. Simply informing me that “hey, you gotta have this looked at soon” isn’t enough; what I need is for my short-term goal ranking to agree with my long-term goal ranking.
Consider someone whose only ambition is to collect every Pokemon in the world.
A contrived scenario. There is no such person, nor will there likely ever be. There might be someone whose only stated, conscious goal is to collect every Pokemon, but their biology prevents them from making that their only actual goal.
So you’re right that we don’t break the bones of Pokemon collectors, but their friends do try make the collector’s long-term goals match up with their short-term goals, and exert social pressure to tame the obsession. As in the above example, pain can be good here.
I don’t think your counterexamples accurately state a scenario or apply kpreid’s reasoning correctly:
He was clear that the pain in surgery conveys no new information. Plus, the bedridden can clearly accomplish some goals.
In this context, it’s not really possible for someone not to have goals. They might not explicitly be able to state long-term goals, but as long as they’re taking deliberate actions, they have goals. And yes, for sufficiently bad goals, you do care how hard it is for the person to carry them out!
The standard is hindrance, not prevention, and any level of pain will hinder, or you will not identify it as pain.
Let me try to explain this better, then. Imagine we take a person who needs surgery but was never told by their doctor what part of their body the surgery will be on. We perform the surgery without any anaesthetic and with the patient blindfolded. In this case, the pain is giving new information (“AAAIE! MY RIGHT LEG!”) but we still don’t approve.
kpreid could clarify that this information is useless (in that the patient doesn’t gain anything from knowing) and that (s)he meant useful information. But this isn’t true either. I could state before the surgery that I will give the patient ten cents if they can tell me which of their limbs I operated on, but this still wouldn’t make it okay to perform surgery without anaesthetic.
The way I would have put kpreid’s point is that the pain must provide sufficiently useful information to offset its painfulness. If putting someone under surgery without anaesthetic earned someone ten cents, I would consider it an atrocity, but if it was necessary so that the patient could help guide the surgeon by telling them what they feel, saving the patient’s life, then it might be a necessary measure.
However, this seems like straightforward utilitarianism, in which the benefit of getting information must outweigh the cost of having such terrible pain. This means it can’t be used as a definition of why pain is a cost.
I would say that pain is a cost for other reasons, but that when pain conveys information, the information can be a counterbalancing factor. This makes it a mistake to say that the reason pain is a cost is that it doesn’t convey information, equivalent to saying that the reason bombing civilians in Afghanistan is bad is that it doesn’t kill Osama bin Laden. The reason bombing civilians is bad is because murder is wrong. Killing Osama bin Laden would be a potential counterbalancing factor that might justify bombing the civilians, but lack of Osama-killing is not the definition of the evil of murder.
Consider someone whose only ambition is to collect every Pokemon in the world. Kpreid’s scenario suggests a dichotomy: either it is okay to cause this person pain, or the only reason not to cause this person pain is because it might prevent Pokemons from being collected. I don’t think this captures the reason we don’t break the bones of Pokemon collectors (even though we all feel sorely tempted sometimes.)
The plural of Pokémon is Pokémon.
...give me one reason not to break your bones right now.
Because pain is bad? :P
Interesting, how the biggest karma gains are from replies which aren’t serious (please don’t downvote this :)
I could explain it, but then the joke wouldn’t be funny anymore. ;)
Without commenting on the rest of your comment, I would like to clarify a point:
The first little twinge (also, mechanical sensation that is not pain) in any given spot tells them what’s going on and is useful. The rest of it that sums up to “AAAIE!” is useless-and-therefore-bad.
Also, it’s common for someone to not want to know what’s going on; they would prefer, not just the absence of pain, but any sensation, any information from the body part(s) involved; this is reasonable and, I would argue, a separate module from the badness of (some) pain.
I would agree with this statement. This person’s ambition does not involve not having pain; they would gladly be tortured for six years if that were the most efficient way of getting one more Pokemon.
Does “not having pain” count as an ambition? If so, then probably anything we like or dislike can be described as ambition or goal, and “pain interferes with our goals” reduces to liitle more than “we don’t like pain”.
Well, “ambition” isn’t much of a word for it, seeing as how it isn’t very ambitious. But yes, I think that we can generally describe our likes and dislikes as goals, in which case not liking pain very much makes pain interfere with our goals.
Good point; I wasn’t careful to distinguish between a “benefit” and an “outweighed cost”. However, as I mentioned in another comment, akrasia can blur the distinction. For example, what if pain causes me to take the necessary action against a minor health problem before it becomes a major problem, when otherwise I’d procrastinate? My future self would be very thankful.
Yet you cannot view the pain as some add-on attribute here. The displeasure is part of its usefulness. Simply informing me that “hey, you gotta have this looked at soon” isn’t enough; what I need is for my short-term goal ranking to agree with my long-term goal ranking.
A contrived scenario. There is no such person, nor will there likely ever be. There might be someone whose only stated, conscious goal is to collect every Pokemon, but their biology prevents them from making that their only actual goal.
So you’re right that we don’t break the bones of Pokemon collectors, but their friends do try make the collector’s long-term goals match up with their short-term goals, and exert social pressure to tame the obsession. As in the above example, pain can be good here.