Marius comments on Crime and punishment - Less Wrong

39 Post author: PhilGoetz 24 March 2011 09:53PM

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Comment author: PhilGoetz 24 March 2011 10:49:19PM *  4 points [-]

I agree. You made this comment while I was revising the post to talk about justice as fairness. You might want to read it again, and see the Rawls link.

One of the directions I want to go in with this, is to explore the idea that the utilitarian may want to discard this evolutionary baggage. It seems appealing, doesn't it? But this "baggage" is exactly the same kind of baggage as enjoying sex, which we evolved in order to reproduce. The question is: Why is enjoying sex a value we want to keep, while enjoying punishing is a value we don't want to keep?

Comment author: Marius 25 March 2011 02:33:21AM 1 point [-]

It's an interesting distinction, I'll need to think more on how I feel about it.

I would certainly be hesitant to discard most evolutionary baggage, however. http://xkcd.com/592/