For future versions of myself, my preferences align pretty well with average utilitarianism (albeit with some caveats)
Could you explain? Those sound like awfully big caveats. If I consider the population of “future versions of myself” as unchangeable, then average utilitarianism and total utilitarianism are equivalent. If I consider that population as changeable, then average utilitarianism seems to suggest changing it by removing the ones with lowest utility: e.g. putting my retirement savings on the roulette wheel and finding some means of painless suicide if I lose.
Yes, but this is the “consider my population unchangeable” case I mentioned, wherein “average” and “total” cease being distinct. Certainly if we calculate average utility by summing 1 won-at-roulette future with 37 killed-myself futures and dividing by 38, then we get a lousy result, but it (as well as the result of any other hypothetical future plans) is isomorphic to what we’d have gotten if we’d obtained total utility by summing those futures and then not dividing. To distinguish average utility from total utility we have to be able to make plans which affect the denominator of that average.
Not for hedonistic utlitarianism—there only fear of death is bad (or the death of people who don’t get replaced by others of equivalent or equal happiness).
Could you explain? Those sound like awfully big caveats. If I consider the population of “future versions of myself” as unchangeable, then average utilitarianism and total utilitarianism are equivalent. If I consider that population as changeable, then average utilitarianism seems to suggest changing it by removing the ones with lowest utility: e.g. putting my retirement savings on the roulette wheel and finding some means of painless suicide if I lose.
Death is a major source of negative utility even if one accepts average utilitarianism.
Yes, but this is the “consider my population unchangeable” case I mentioned, wherein “average” and “total” cease being distinct. Certainly if we calculate average utility by summing 1 won-at-roulette future with 37 killed-myself futures and dividing by 38, then we get a lousy result, but it (as well as the result of any other hypothetical future plans) is isomorphic to what we’d have gotten if we’d obtained total utility by summing those futures and then not dividing. To distinguish average utility from total utility we have to be able to make plans which affect the denominator of that average.
Not for hedonistic utlitarianism—there only fear of death is bad (or the death of people who don’t get replaced by others of equivalent or equal happiness).