TheOtherDave comments on Rationality Quotes: July 2010 - Less Wrong

4 Post author: komponisto 01 July 2010 09:24PM

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Comment author: TheOtherDave 24 December 2010 03:52:02PM 6 points [-]

The situations in which a habitual killer-of-humans will cause death come up more often than the situations in which a habitual letter-of-humans-die will cause death. If you're a consequentialist who negatively values death, it seems to follow that a habit of killing humans is worse than a habit of letting them die.

Comment author: fortyeridania 24 December 2010 04:42:30PM 1 point [-]

Thank you for pointing out this argument.

I'm not sure I agree that "let-die" situations arise less often than "kill" situations. It seems that every moment you have disposable income (i.e. more than you and yours need to survive) involves a choice between saving someone's life and not saving anyone's life.

Comment author: TheOtherDave 24 December 2010 08:16:33PM 0 points [-]

(nods) That's fair.

And yes, if it makes sense to classify what I'm doing right now as choosing not to avert avoidable deaths, it follows that my lifestyle is morally worse (from a consequentialist perspective) than that of a poor murderer.