mattnewport comments on Cultivating our own gardens - Less Wrong

6 [deleted] 31 May 2010 08:05PM

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Comment author: mattnewport 01 June 2010 05:38:45PM *  1 point [-]

There is a meaningful distinction between believing that utility should be agent neutral and believing that it should be agent relative. I tend to assume people are advocating an agent neutral utility function when they call themselves utilitarian since as you point out it is rather a useless distinction otherwise. What terminology do you use to reflect this distinction if not utilitarian/non-utilitarian?

It's the agent neutral utilitarians that I think are dangerous and wrong. The other kind (if you want to still call them utilitarians) are just saying the best way to maximize utility is to maximize utility which I have a hard time arguing with.

Comment author: PhilGoetz 01 June 2010 06:41:10PM 1 point [-]

There is a meaningful distinction between believing that utility should be agent neutral and believing that it should be agent relative.

Yes; but I've never thought of utilitarianism as being on one side or the other of that choice. Very often, when we talk about a utility function, we're talking about an agent's personal, agent-centric utility function.

Comment author: mattnewport 01 June 2010 06:59:29PM 3 points [-]

As an ethical system it seems to me that utilitarianism strongly implies agent neutral utility. See the wikipedia entry for example. I get the impression that this is what most people who call themselves utilitarians mean.