SaidAchmiz: Babies are not morally important. Lumifer: A mother would disagree! SaidAchmiz: Yeah, but that doesn’t tell us much, because someone might also disagree with the same thing about the Mona Lisa (Implication: And there, they would clearly be wrong, so the fact that a person makes such a claim is not particularly meaningful.)
A … random person off the street would disagree? People who are cool with eating babies be rare, mate. Even rarer than people who consider the Mona Lisa morally important (by the same order of magnitude as human lives, anyway.)
Um, are you by any chance a psychopath*? This seems like a basic part of the human operating system, subjectively.
*Not a serious question, unless you are in which case this is valuable information to bear in mind.
Be careful how broadly you cast the “basic part of the human operating system” net. Even without the Typical Mind Fallacy, there are some pretty big and pretty surprising cultural differences out there. (Not that I am necessarily claiming such differences to be the cause of any disagreement in this particular case.)
As for the random person off the street… a random person off the street is likely to disagree with many utilitarian (or ethical in general) claims that your average LessWronger might make. How much weight should we give to this disagreement?
Be careful how broadly you cast the “basic part of the human operating system” net.
I try to be. But that is certainly the subjective experience of my valuing the lives of children.
As for the random person off the street… a random person off the street is likely to disagree with many utilitarian (or ethical in general) claims that your average LessWronger might make. How much weight should we give to this disagreement?
That depends on our grounds for believing we have identified their mistake, of course.
The question of whether the aesthetic value of beautiful objects can be terminal is an interesting but unrelated question.
Unrelated to what...?
The discussion has gone like so:
SaidAchmiz: Babies are not morally important.
Lumifer: A mother would disagree!
SaidAchmiz: Yeah, but that doesn’t tell us much, because someone might also disagree with the same thing about the Mona Lisa (Implication: And there, they would clearly be wrong, so the fact that a person makes such a claim is not particularly meaningful.)
A … random person off the street would disagree? People who are cool with eating babies be rare, mate. Even rarer than people who consider the Mona Lisa morally important (by the same order of magnitude as human lives, anyway.)
Um, are you by any chance a psychopath*? This seems like a basic part of the human operating system, subjectively.
*Not a serious question, unless you are in which case this is valuable information to bear in mind.
Be careful how broadly you cast the “basic part of the human operating system” net. Even without the Typical Mind Fallacy, there are some pretty big and pretty surprising cultural differences out there. (Not that I am necessarily claiming such differences to be the cause of any disagreement in this particular case.)
As for the random person off the street… a random person off the street is likely to disagree with many utilitarian (or ethical in general) claims that your average LessWronger might make. How much weight should we give to this disagreement?
I try to be. But that is certainly the subjective experience of my valuing the lives of children.
That depends on our grounds for believing we have identified their mistake, of course.