I’ll admit it’s rather shaky and I’d be saying the same thing if I’d merely been brainwashed. It doesn’t feel like it was precipitated by anything other than legitimate moral argument, though. If I can be brainwashed out of my “terminal values” so easily, and it really doesn’t feel like something to resist, then I’d like a sturdier basis on which to base my moral reasoning.
This could of course use more detail, unless you understand what I’m getting at.
My fault for failing to clarify. There are roughly three ways one can talk about changes to an agent’s terminal values.
(1) Such changes never happen. (At a society level, this proposition appears to be false).
(2) Such changes happen through rational processes (i.e. reasoning).
(3) Such changes happen through non-rational processes (e.g. tribal affiliation + mindkilling).
I was using “conversion” as a metaphorical shorthand for the third type of change.
BTW, you might want to change “conversation” to “conversion” in the grandparent.
Ah! Thanks.
Ok. Then my answer to that is roughly this:
This could of course use more detail, unless you understand what I’m getting at.