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thomblake comments on Only humans can have human values - Less Wrong
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First of all, good post.
My main response is, aren't we running on hostile hardware? I am not the entire system called "Matt Simpson." I am a program, or a particular set of programs, running on the system called "Matt Simpson." This system runs lots of other programs. Some, like automatically pulling my hand away after I touch a hot stove, happen to achieve my values. Others, like running from or attacking anything that vaguely resembles a snake, are a minor annoyance. Still others, like the system wanting to violently attack other males, work directly counter to my values.
The hard problem of ethics - determining what our values actually are - is (partially?) reduced to determining which parts of the system are me. Which is still a hard problem. (Despite my language, I don't really think this is an identity problem)
Agreed, and a lot of the disputes in this realm come from people drawing identity in different ways. I submit that I am the entire system called "Thom Blake" as well as a bunch of other stuff like my smartphone and car.
Once you give up Platonic identity (or the immortal soul) you also get to have much fuzzier boundaries. A dualist who thinks "I am my mind" cannot imagine losing a part of oneself without "no longer being me", and thinks that cutting off one's hand has no impact on "who I really am". I think that cutting off my hand will have a great impact on me, in terms of my self and my identity, and cutting off my right hand less so than my left.