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MugaSofer comments on If it were morally correct to kill everyone on earth, would you do it? - Less Wrong
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Um ... most people don't want to die. That in and of itself would seem to suggest you may possibly have gone wrong somewhere in this line of reasoning.
More generally, are you a strict hedonic utilitarian? Because I can see how focusing solely on pleasure etc. could lead to that conclusion, but I think most LWers are closer to preference utilitarians.
It would suggest it, but it's not that strong evidence. Most people are okay with factory farming. Most people put little value on things they don't consider themselves responsible for.
I am but I could understand valuing anything you can experience. Valuing things that can't be experienced just seems silly. Would you value ice cream independent of your ability to taste it?
OTOH, in my experience at least, people become a lot less biased when it comes to themselves. Few people would want to be factory farmed ;)
Personally? No. But I can imagine a paperclipper that would gladly sacrifice it's life to save the paperclip collection.
Do they, or does their bias just change?
In my experience, people value themselves vastly more than they value other people. Ergo, if you replace them with someone else, they consider it a huge loss in utility.
It's possible that rationality tends to bias you away from your natural impassiveness to large groups and other "far" situations. There's a post on this, "Shut up and divide". But there do seem to be genuine biases leading to underestimates of their suffering, not just knowing about it and not caring.