Clippy comments on Virtue Ethics for Consequentialists - Less Wrong
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Comments (178)
Okay, if you want to generalize the concept of gluttony broadly enough that it has an analog for Clippys, then the definition you have chosen suffices for this purpose, and I can recognize that as being a vice, for two reasons:
a) It is certainly undesirable to merely make paperclips directly without concern for how many more paperclips could be made, over the long term, by doing something else; and
b) I do often feel "temptation" to do such behavior, like bending metal wires when machines could do a better job, just as humans have "temptations" toward vices.
Your argument is accepted.
Clippy, how do you overcome this kind of temptation? A human analogy might be refusing to push the fat man, even when it saves more lives, but not everyone considers that a vice.
I typically just do computations on how many more paperclips would be undergoing bending by machines, or observe paperclips under construction.
A better analogy would be human gluttony, in which there is a temptation to consume much more than optimal, which most regard as a vice, I believe.