The problem: simplified measuring system. Any time you privilege exactly one of the things humans care about over all the others you get confusing or weird results.
An example: A drug that makes you live 1000 years longer, but makes you about as intelligent as a cow. I would not take this drug, nor would I expect most people to, but that’s baffling if you simply consider it in terms of “years of life gained”.
The number that utilitarians try to make go up is a lot more complicated than any one factor.
That’s a very good point. I assumed that, for simplicity’s sake, when discussing years added, that they would all be, on average, worthwhile years that the person whose life is being extended would want to live. So actually, rather than just “amount of years,” I should have said “amount of years that contain worthwhile experiences.” It seems to me that that is a pretty close approximation to the number utilitarians are trying to make go up.
It seems to me that [amount of years that contain worthwhile experiences] is a pretty close approximation to the number utilitarians are trying to make go up.
I’m highly doubtful. I can easily imagine a utilitarian dying to save their child or fighting in a war. If your model of utilitarianism doesn’t allow that or concludes that real people in real circumstances are that badly miscalibrated, that’s a problem with your model.
That’s true, but it can be explained by the belief that losing a war will reduce the amount of positive experiences in their lives, and that they would rather have their child have positive experiences than have them themselves. But it is true that there are probably some values that can’t be reduced to an experience. For instance most people prefer to actually accomplish their goals in life and would not want to have a faked experience of accomplishing that.
The problem: simplified measuring system. Any time you privilege exactly one of the things humans care about over all the others you get confusing or weird results.
An example: A drug that makes you live 1000 years longer, but makes you about as intelligent as a cow. I would not take this drug, nor would I expect most people to, but that’s baffling if you simply consider it in terms of “years of life gained”.
The number that utilitarians try to make go up is a lot more complicated than any one factor.
That’s a very good point. I assumed that, for simplicity’s sake, when discussing years added, that they would all be, on average, worthwhile years that the person whose life is being extended would want to live. So actually, rather than just “amount of years,” I should have said “amount of years that contain worthwhile experiences.” It seems to me that that is a pretty close approximation to the number utilitarians are trying to make go up.
I’ll edit the OP to make that clearer.
I’m highly doubtful. I can easily imagine a utilitarian dying to save their child or fighting in a war. If your model of utilitarianism doesn’t allow that or concludes that real people in real circumstances are that badly miscalibrated, that’s a problem with your model.
That’s true, but it can be explained by the belief that losing a war will reduce the amount of positive experiences in their lives, and that they would rather have their child have positive experiences than have them themselves. But it is true that there are probably some values that can’t be reduced to an experience. For instance most people prefer to actually accomplish their goals in life and would not want to have a faked experience of accomplishing that.