nshepperd comments on Is my view contrarian? - Less Wrong

22 Post author: lukeprog 11 March 2014 05:42PM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (94)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: nshepperd 13 March 2014 09:23:43PM -1 points [-]

If "X is good" was simply an empirical claim about whether an object conforms to a person's values, people would frequently say things like "if my values approved of X, then X would be good" and would not say things like "taking a murder pill doesn't affect the fact that murder is bad".

Alternative: what if "X is good" was a mathematical claim about the value of a thing according to whatever values the speaker actually holds?

Comment author: tom_cr 13 March 2014 10:03:10PM 0 points [-]

If "X is good" was simply an empirical claim about whether an object conforms to a person's values, people would frequently say things like "if my values approved of X, then X would be good"....

If that is your basis for a scientific standard, then I'm afraid I must withdraw from this discussion.

Ditto, if this is your idea of humor.

what if "X is good" was a mathematical claim about the value of a thing according to whatever values the speaker actually holds?

That's just silly. What if c = 299,792,458 m/s is a mathematical claim about the speed of light, according to what the speed of light actually is? May I suggest that you don't invent unnecessary complexity to disguise the demise of a long deceased argument.

No further comment from me.