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PhilGoetz comments on Luminosity (Twilight fanfic) Part 2 Discussion Thread - Less Wrong
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I think you're confusing things by conflating ethical value and economic value.
Edit: Also, even assuming you want to equate ethical and economic value, a human still has more value since he can create things of value much better then a wolf.
I think you're confusing things by postulating the existence of two different kinds of values.
If you had two kinds of values, how would you ever make a decision?
I think you're supposing that when I say "value", I mean dollars. I didn't say that.
You use economic principals to justify assigning value to biodiversity when you said "the fact that value depends on scarcity is a fundamental economic principle."
I think the most reasonable interpretation of that sentence is: more me biodiversity/scarcity is an instrumental value and my terminal values are based on economic/market value.
If this is incorrect could you explain what you meant, since the only other explanation I can think of is that it was a flimsy attempt to rationalize your valuing biodiversity.
Value is value. You can't have two separate types of value if you're going to make a decision. You can't say, "I'm going to use economic value for economic decisions, and ethical value for ethical decisions", because decisions don't break down nicely for you into those categories.
Economic value and ethical value need to be merged. And the result will look more like economic value, because economic value is well-studied and quantified, while the main point of the category "ethical value" is to be vague and slippery, so that people can avoid actually getting answers about ethics.
Economic value, a.k.a., market value, is how much something would be worth on the market. Ethical value is my personal utility function.
Data point: I maintain both concepts and yet don't feel confused.