ec429 comments on [link] Is Alu Life? - Less Wrong

-8 Post author: ec429 07 April 2012 09:24PM

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Tags: biology evolution xenology genetics ethics

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Comment author: pedanterrific 07 April 2012 10:36:53PM *  2 points [-]

The potential moral implications of Alu being life have nothing to do with multiplying by the number of transposons, they have to do with realizing that what you value isn't "life".

What definition of "life" is satisfied by both a transposon and an AI?

Edit: Did you learn ethics from Orson Scott Card or something?

If we consider all life to have ethical value (and we must, if we wish to be raman and not varelse), and if we classify transposons and other mobile genetic elements as life, then it is a simple syllogism to conclude that transposons have ethical value.

Comment author: ec429 07 April 2012 10:43:42PM 0 points [-]

My ethics were influenced a nonzero amount by reading Orson Scott Card. More to the point, OSC provided terminology which I felt was both useful and likely to be understood by my audience.

I now think that my use of the word "must" in the above-quoted passage was a mistake.

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