prase comments on Consequentialism Need Not Be Nearsighted - Less Wrong

53 Post author: orthonormal 02 September 2011 07:37AM

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Comment author: prase 31 August 2011 11:25:27AM *  6 points [-]

The probability of being killed in such a way would be tiny and wouldn't significantly alter expected lifespan. However people are bad at intuitive risk evaluation and even if any person would at least twice more likely have their life saved than destroyed because of the policy, people would feel endangered and unhappy, which fact may overweigh the positive benefit. But if this concern didn't apply (e.g. if most people learned to evaluate risks correctly on the intuitive level), I'd bite the bullet and vote for the policy.

By the way, upvoted for correct application of least convenient possible world technique.