taw comments on Our House, My Rules - Less Wrong

36 Post author: David_J_Balan 02 November 2009 12:44AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Article Navigation

Comments (229)
Tags: kids morality

Comments (229)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: alyssavance 02 November 2009 01:43:25AM *  8 points [-]

"But you wouldn't be hearing this "I'm higher than you in the pecking order and don't you dare forget it" attitude that is so very common."

The human race is, essentially, a species of upgraded monkeys, and there is (so far as I can see) no way to have two large groups of people, one of which strictly dominates the other, without this particular monkey behavior being ubiquitous. This holds true even when the child, in some sense, has higher utility (eg., when the parents would sacrifice their lives for their child's life, as parents often do). The only real alternative is to give children as a whole higher status, by, say, rewriting the laws so that children are not essentially their parent's property.

Comment author: taw 02 November 2009 02:05:20AM 2 points [-]

when the parents would sacrifice their lives for their child's life, as parents often do

Is there any evidence for this being more than just talk?

Comment author: wedrifid 02 November 2009 02:35:49AM 8 points [-]

It's extremely hard to sacrifice yourself for someone else. There just aren't many situations where making yourself dead is the best and only way to make someone else stay alive.

Comment author: Breakfast 02 November 2009 04:59:06AM 5 points [-]

But parents — probably the vast majority of them — routinely make tremendous sacrifices in every area of their lives for their children, which seems to come pretty darn close.

Comment author: taw 02 November 2009 10:00:08AM 0 points [-]

Evidence of these "tremendous sacrifices" being... ?

Comment author: Technologos 02 November 2009 10:07:19AM 12 points [-]

In my experience at least:

  • Thousands of hours invested in directly providing care, travel, and other services
  • Hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in education, food, clothing, etc.
  • The sacrifice of one parent's career
  • Choosing housing locations based primarily on educational and social opportunities for the children, rather than convenience for employment or entertainment

Are these similar to dying for a child? I don't know. It's possible that the sum of the financial equivalent of the above is comparable to a statistical life, but I'm just giving rough estimates.

Comment author: wedrifid 02 November 2009 10:02:04AM 5 points [-]

Child birth.

Comment author: DanArmak 02 November 2009 10:07:02AM 2 points [-]

Can you substantiate the claim that giving birth is a sacrifice made for the child as opposed to for the future good of the mother herself?

In general I find it hard to believe that people would choose to become parents for the sake of a potential child, who will only exist because they decide so, unless they expect to enjoy raising a child at least some of the time, or otherwise profit from it (social approval, commitment between married partners, support in old age, government aid).

Comment author: Technologos 02 November 2009 10:08:58AM 7 points [-]

Are any sacrifices provably made "for the recipient" rather than "because the sacrificer gains some (intangible) value from having made it?"

Comment author: DanArmak 02 November 2009 10:20:18AM 2 points [-]

Point taken, it may be too fuzzy a term to distinguish.

Comment author: wedrifid 02 November 2009 10:24:38AM 1 point [-]

In general I find it hard to believe that people would choose to become parents for the sake of a potential child, who will only exist because they decide so

I'm sure many of the siblings of our ancestors chose otherwise. But I'd be surprised if that choice stayed popular.

unless they expect to enjoy raising a child at least some of the time, or otherwise profit from it (social approval, commitment between married partners, support in old age, government aid).

Those reasons help. But our instincts give an extra boost when it comes to both expecting and remembering.

Powered by Reddit Powered by Reddit