Your claim that harms adversely impact reproduction is controversial because of the obvious counter examples.
My point is probabilistic (natural selection is about probability) and statistical (in large groups, probabilities become statistical regularities). So let us see how the objections fare.
X has already lost their ability to reproduce.
This doesn’t prevent harm from adversely impacting reproduction probabilistically even if we include the groups that lost their ability to reproduce. Take a large and representative sample of humanity, and harm them all in some way—say, reduce their ability to see. While there will be some who have no ability to reproduce that can be lost in the first place, many—the majority—still have that ability. And so we can see an overall reduction of reproduction in that group despite the fact that some subgroup had already lost the ability.
X may not even care about reproducing.
In a large and representative sample of humanity, many care about reproducing. So, same as above.
It’s still harmful to X to strap him down and torture him.
I would wager that, on average, someone who has been badly tortured does not fare as well in his later life as someone who has not.
Also, natural selection doesn’t care about whether I can reproduce.
Actually it does, in the sense meant. To say that natural selection “cares about” A and does not “care about” B is simply to say that A is a factor and B is not, in determining selection. Obviously, whether you reproduce is a factor in determining whether your genes are selected.
I’m not really sure what you’re trying to argue. At first, it seemed fairly obvious that you were trying to say that harm is that which reduces reproduction. Now it seems you’re saying that harm is that, which, if widely inflicted upon a group, probabilistically reduces that group’s rate of reproduction—but I don’t want to take that for granted. Maybe I’m misinterpreting you again. If suppose what you could be saying is that harming people, in general, tends to make them have less children. I don’t in fact think it’s obvious that there’s any such correlation—having lots of children is not generally a sign of high levels of wealth, health, income, education or freedom—but let’s assume that there is. What does that have to do with drug addiction. When we look at a drug addict we don’t think “poor guy—probably won’t have many kids”, nor indeed would we accept a demonstration of his high reproductive capacity as evidence that being a drug addict isn’t harmful. So, confused as I am, could you state your position one more time, as clearly as you can?
When we look at a drug addict we don’t think “poor guy—probably won’t have many kids”
That’s right. But I was addressing this point:
It is not at all clear that the people resistant to addictive drugs are reproducing at a higher rate than those who aren’t.
Since someone had made this comment, and since I was addressing this comment, then it’s neither here nor there whether we typically think about the drug addict’s reproduction. That comment concerned that question, so regardless of whether it is something we normally think about, it’s something that the commenter was thinking about.
, nor indeed would we accept a demonstration of his high reproductive capacity as evidence that being a drug addict isn’t harmful.
Well, it’s hard to really gather the relevant evidence. To really sort out cause and effect it’s really very weak just to gather evidence from the population like that. So, sure, in the practical world we probably should doubt such evidence unless it was really overwhelming (such as a planet-of-the-apes scenario in which the meth heads take over the planet).
We can easily recognize most harms simply by looking—we can recognize when someone is hurt. E.g., they’re bleeding, or they’re bruised, or they have trouble walking, or they’re disoriented, etc. We can tell. So we don’t need to do a vast demographic study to see whether the particular harm in question would reduce probability reproduction. Nevertheless, I think we can be sure that it would in fact reproduce probability of reproduction, simply by considering it from an evolutionary standpoint. I don’t think there can be any serious doubt that, on average, a recognizable harm does reduce the probability of reproduction (on average, over a large enough population).
I’m quite certain that harms reduce probability of reproduction. This is why I’m quite certain that if drug addicts are harmed by their addiction, this must reduce their probability of reproduction. Obviously, on average. If you come up with crazy scenarios such as one of the commenters did, then in individual cases addiction might lead to enhanced reproduction. For example, if someone puts a gun to your head and tells you they’ll shoot you if you don’t become an addict, then obviously in this specific situation, becoming an addict will increase your average lifespan and, if you’re fertile, will give you more chance to reproduce. But strange hypotheticals aside, I am sure that harms adversely impact reproduction.
The problem is that half the time you make a very strong (and obviously false) claim, e.g. that impeding reproduction is a necessity for something to be considered harmful, and the other half time you make a claim as weak (and trivially true) as “what we call harms tend to be negatively correlated with reproductive success”.
The problem is that you are reading Constant looking for Gotchas, rather than reading him for intended meaning. If you read him as if he was Darwin, his meaning is apparent.
“Apparent” isn’t a function with one parameter isApparent(meaning) but rather two: isApparent(reader, meaning) . See illusion of transparency
If “his meaning is apparent” to you, then perhaps you can attempt to answer all of the questions and hypotheticals that Constant either failed to answer or seemed to me to answer in a contradictory manner. Among other things:
is being enslaved for breeding purposes “harm”?
Is a woman denying you fertile sex doing you “harm”?
Are people using contraception harming themselves? Are they aware of this harm?
If an uFAI reduced us to the intellectual level of cattle to be bred in ranches (but didn’t kill us or reduce our reproductive potential) would it be harming us?
What about APMason’s thought experiment regarding Reproductene ?
If Constant’s meaning is apparent to you (as it is not apparent to me), and you agree with that meaning, then perhaps you can answer all of the above questions.
No one is going to enslave a male for breeding purposes, and the once common practice enslaving a female for breeding purposes is harm. In the ancestral environment, she will in the long term have fewer offspring, since obviously the offspring of freewomen did better, had more assets invested in them, and so forth.
Is a woman denying you fertile sex doing you “harm”?
No. And neither is someone who turns you down at a job interview doing you harm.
Are people using contraception harming themselves?
Sometimes.
Are they aware of this harm?
When they become cat ladies and start giving their cats birthday parties.
If an uFAI reduced us to the intellectual level of cattle to be bred in ranches (but didn’t kill us or reduce our reproductive potential) would it be harming us?
This would require it to first conquer, dominate and rule us, which certainly would harm us. If it subsequently decided to breed us like cattle, this would make its rule slightly less harmful.
What about APMason’s thought experiment regarding Reproductene ?
Thought experiments are apt to be contrary to the ancestral environment.
In the ancestral environment, she will in the long term have fewer offspring, since obviously the offspring of freewomen did better, had more assets invested in them, and so forth.
The words “ancestral environment” were nowhere in the definitions and claims about “harm” that were offered previously in the thread.
If you use the “ancestral environment” context to qualify previous claims about what constitutes harm (by arguing that harm are things that tended to reduce reproductive capacity in the ancestral enviroment), then it follows you ought also use the differences between the ancestral environment and the CURRENT environment (or hypothetical future environments) to figure out how our moral intuitions now about what constitutes harm now is different from what promotes or reduces reproductive capacity now.
I see you plan to insist on this policy of insults and attempts at knocking the other person’s status, whenever you’re asked to offer arguments instead.
You and Constant have not been able to produce a coherent functional philosophy about what constitutes “harm” to people. Repeatedly we give you counterexamples that prove your arguments false. That prove that modern human intuitions about harm coincide little with reproductive success.
To this you only repeat (time and again): “But natural selection produced us, so they necessarily need to.” Which is blatantly obvious in the first part, and blatantly false in the second part.
Natural selection produced us, but no they don’t need to. With numerous examples and thought experiments we show you how the human concept of “harm” does NOT correspond to reproductive success. That modern people do not consider contraception “harm”. That modern people do consider sexual slavery bad.
To this you, sam, only have insults to offer. Your philosophy fails both to correspond with reality, and in regards with any few falsifiable predictions it offers, it FAILS at them too.
tldr; Go away and don’t return until you learn that beliefs should seek to correspond with reality (not with Darwin), and that language should be used to communicate meaning, not insults.
Okay. I get it now. If you really were just saying that bad things happening to people make it less likely they’ll reproduce, well… I don’t necessarily agree. I don’t have the relevant data. But that’s not the position I thought I was arguing against before, I don’t think it can be resolved without more information, and I’m not sure it’s all that important to resolve it. I’ll assume that you’re answer to the Reproductene question is that, yes, it’s harmful, unless you say otherwise.
My point is probabilistic (natural selection is about probability) and statistical (in large groups, probabilities become statistical regularities). So let us see how the objections fare.
This doesn’t prevent harm from adversely impacting reproduction probabilistically even if we include the groups that lost their ability to reproduce. Take a large and representative sample of humanity, and harm them all in some way—say, reduce their ability to see. While there will be some who have no ability to reproduce that can be lost in the first place, many—the majority—still have that ability. And so we can see an overall reduction of reproduction in that group despite the fact that some subgroup had already lost the ability.
In a large and representative sample of humanity, many care about reproducing. So, same as above.
I would wager that, on average, someone who has been badly tortured does not fare as well in his later life as someone who has not.
Actually it does, in the sense meant. To say that natural selection “cares about” A and does not “care about” B is simply to say that A is a factor and B is not, in determining selection. Obviously, whether you reproduce is a factor in determining whether your genes are selected.
I’m not really sure what you’re trying to argue. At first, it seemed fairly obvious that you were trying to say that harm is that which reduces reproduction. Now it seems you’re saying that harm is that, which, if widely inflicted upon a group, probabilistically reduces that group’s rate of reproduction—but I don’t want to take that for granted. Maybe I’m misinterpreting you again. If suppose what you could be saying is that harming people, in general, tends to make them have less children. I don’t in fact think it’s obvious that there’s any such correlation—having lots of children is not generally a sign of high levels of wealth, health, income, education or freedom—but let’s assume that there is. What does that have to do with drug addiction. When we look at a drug addict we don’t think “poor guy—probably won’t have many kids”, nor indeed would we accept a demonstration of his high reproductive capacity as evidence that being a drug addict isn’t harmful. So, confused as I am, could you state your position one more time, as clearly as you can?
That’s right. But I was addressing this point:
Since someone had made this comment, and since I was addressing this comment, then it’s neither here nor there whether we typically think about the drug addict’s reproduction. That comment concerned that question, so regardless of whether it is something we normally think about, it’s something that the commenter was thinking about.
Well, it’s hard to really gather the relevant evidence. To really sort out cause and effect it’s really very weak just to gather evidence from the population like that. So, sure, in the practical world we probably should doubt such evidence unless it was really overwhelming (such as a planet-of-the-apes scenario in which the meth heads take over the planet).
We can easily recognize most harms simply by looking—we can recognize when someone is hurt. E.g., they’re bleeding, or they’re bruised, or they have trouble walking, or they’re disoriented, etc. We can tell. So we don’t need to do a vast demographic study to see whether the particular harm in question would reduce probability reproduction. Nevertheless, I think we can be sure that it would in fact reproduce probability of reproduction, simply by considering it from an evolutionary standpoint. I don’t think there can be any serious doubt that, on average, a recognizable harm does reduce the probability of reproduction (on average, over a large enough population).
I’m quite certain that harms reduce probability of reproduction. This is why I’m quite certain that if drug addicts are harmed by their addiction, this must reduce their probability of reproduction. Obviously, on average. If you come up with crazy scenarios such as one of the commenters did, then in individual cases addiction might lead to enhanced reproduction. For example, if someone puts a gun to your head and tells you they’ll shoot you if you don’t become an addict, then obviously in this specific situation, becoming an addict will increase your average lifespan and, if you’re fertile, will give you more chance to reproduce. But strange hypotheticals aside, I am sure that harms adversely impact reproduction.
The problem is that half the time you make a very strong (and obviously false) claim, e.g. that impeding reproduction is a necessity for something to be considered harmful, and the other half time you make a claim as weak (and trivially true) as “what we call harms tend to be negatively correlated with reproductive success”.
The problem is that you are reading Constant looking for Gotchas, rather than reading him for intended meaning. If you read him as if he was Darwin, his meaning is apparent.
“Apparent” isn’t a function with one parameter isApparent(meaning) but rather two: isApparent(reader, meaning) . See illusion of transparency
If “his meaning is apparent” to you, then perhaps you can attempt to answer all of the questions and hypotheticals that Constant either failed to answer or seemed to me to answer in a contradictory manner. Among other things:
is being enslaved for breeding purposes “harm”?
Is a woman denying you fertile sex doing you “harm”?
Are people using contraception harming themselves? Are they aware of this harm?
If an uFAI reduced us to the intellectual level of cattle to be bred in ranches (but didn’t kill us or reduce our reproductive potential) would it be harming us?
What about APMason’s thought experiment regarding Reproductene ?
If Constant’s meaning is apparent to you (as it is not apparent to me), and you agree with that meaning, then perhaps you can answer all of the above questions.
No one is going to enslave a male for breeding purposes, and the once common practice enslaving a female for breeding purposes is harm. In the ancestral environment, she will in the long term have fewer offspring, since obviously the offspring of freewomen did better, had more assets invested in them, and so forth.
No. And neither is someone who turns you down at a job interview doing you harm.
Sometimes.
When they become cat ladies and start giving their cats birthday parties.
This would require it to first conquer, dominate and rule us, which certainly would harm us. If it subsequently decided to breed us like cattle, this would make its rule slightly less harmful.
Thought experiments are apt to be contrary to the ancestral environment.
The words “ancestral environment” were nowhere in the definitions and claims about “harm” that were offered previously in the thread.
If you use the “ancestral environment” context to qualify previous claims about what constitutes harm (by arguing that harm are things that tended to reduce reproductive capacity in the ancestral enviroment), then it follows you ought also use the differences between the ancestral environment and the CURRENT environment (or hypothetical future environments) to figure out how our moral intuitions now about what constitutes harm now is different from what promotes or reduces reproductive capacity now.
My reply assumed I was speaking to someone at least vaguely familiar with ideas, language, and assumptions of natural selection.
I see you plan to insist on this policy of insults and attempts at knocking the other person’s status, whenever you’re asked to offer arguments instead.
You and Constant have not been able to produce a coherent functional philosophy about what constitutes “harm” to people. Repeatedly we give you counterexamples that prove your arguments false. That prove that modern human intuitions about harm coincide little with reproductive success.
To this you only repeat (time and again): “But natural selection produced us, so they necessarily need to.” Which is blatantly obvious in the first part, and blatantly false in the second part.
Natural selection produced us, but no they don’t need to. With numerous examples and thought experiments we show you how the human concept of “harm” does NOT correspond to reproductive success. That modern people do not consider contraception “harm”. That modern people do consider sexual slavery bad.
To this you, sam, only have insults to offer. Your philosophy fails both to correspond with reality, and in regards with any few falsifiable predictions it offers, it FAILS at them too.
tldr; Go away and don’t return until you learn that beliefs should seek to correspond with reality (not with Darwin), and that language should be used to communicate meaning, not insults.
I have to say, I’m not actually sure that is trivially true, but I was confused as well.
Okay. I get it now. If you really were just saying that bad things happening to people make it less likely they’ll reproduce, well… I don’t necessarily agree. I don’t have the relevant data. But that’s not the position I thought I was arguing against before, I don’t think it can be resolved without more information, and I’m not sure it’s all that important to resolve it. I’ll assume that you’re answer to the Reproductene question is that, yes, it’s harmful, unless you say otherwise.