TimS comments on We Don't Have a Utility Function - Less Wrong

43 [deleted] 02 April 2013 03:49AM

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Comment author: TimS 05 April 2013 02:04:30AM *  5 points [-]

I think this community vastly over-estimates its grip on meta-ethical concepts like moral realism or moral anti-realism. (E.g. the hopelessly confused discussion in this thread). I don't think the meta-ethics sequence resolves these sorts of basic issues.

Comment author: MindTheLeap 05 April 2013 04:13:34AM 1 point [-]

I'm still coming to terms with the philosophical definitions of different positions and their implications, and the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy seems like a more rounded account of the different view points than the meta-ethics sequences. I think I might be better off first spending my time continuing to read the SEP and trying to make my own decisions, and then reading the meta-ethics sequences with that understanding of the philosophical background.

By the way, I can see your point that objections to moral anti-realism in this community may be somewhat motivated by the possibility that friendly AI becomes unprovable. As I understand it, any action can be "rational" if the value/utility function is arbitrary.