JoachimSchipper comments on Recognizing memetic infections and forging resistance memes - Less Wrong

4 Post author: Johnicholas 26 April 2012 02:40PM

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Comment author: Johnicholas 27 April 2012 11:38:14AM 3 points [-]

Analogous in that people once discriminated against other races, other sexes, but over time with better ethical arguments, we decided it was better to treat other races, other sexes as worthy members of the "circle of compassion". I predict that if and when we interact with another species with fairly similar might (for example if and when humans speciate) then humancentrism will be considered as terrible as racism or sexism is now.

Moral realism (if I understand it correctly) is the position that moral truths like 'eating babies is wrong' are out in the world something like the law of gravitation. Yudkowsky has argued convincingly in the Baby-Eater sequence against moral realism (and I agree with him). However, he implied a false fork that, if moral realism is false, then humancentrism is the answer. Yes, our sense of morality is based on our history. No, our history is not the same as our species.

DNA is one residue of our history, but libraries are also a similar residue. There are two instances in our history of allying with a very alien form of life: Viral eukaryogenesis, and the alliance with memes.

Does this help at all? I feel like I'm saying the same thing over again just with more words.

Comment author: JoachimSchipper 27 April 2012 12:32:06PM -1 points [-]

Does this have anything to do with the main point of your article? I can find no links, except an unproven theory used only as an analogy.

Comment author: Johnicholas 27 April 2012 02:03:18PM 0 points [-]

No. This is regarding the 'possibly irrelevant rant' which I marked explicitly as a 'possibly irrelevant rant'. The concepts in the rant seemed nearby and inspirational to the main article in my mind when I wrote it, which is why I included it, but I cannot articulate a direct connection.