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Viliam_Bur comments on Ethical frameworks are isomorphic - Less Wrong
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This reminds me of a part of Zombie Sequence, specifically the Giant Lookup Table. Yes, you can approximate consequentialism by a sufficiently complex set of deontological rules, but the question is: Where did those rules come from? What process generated them?
If we somehow wouldn't have any consequentialist intuitions, what is that probability that we would invent a "don't murder" deontological rule, instead of all the possible alternatives? Actually, why would we even feel a need for having any rules?
Deontological rules seem analogical to a lookup table. They are precomputed answers to ethical questions. Yes, they may be correct. Yes, using them is probably much faster than trying to compute them from scratch. But the reason why we have these deontological rules instead of some other deontological rules is partly consequentialism and partly historical accidents.
Where did your utility function come from? What process generated it?
Evolution, of course.
We could classify reflexes and aversions as deontological rules. Some of them would even sound moral-ish, such as "don't hit a person stronger than you" or "don't eat disgusting food". Not completely unlike what some moral systems say. I guess more convincing examples could be found.
But if the rule is more complex, if it requires some thinking and modelling of the situation and other people... then consequences are involved. Maybe imaginary consequences (if we don't give sacrifice to gods, they will be angry and harm us). Though this could be considered merely a rationalization of a rule created by memetic evolution.
Memetic evolution as well. Communes and societies with "bad" deontological rules do not survive.
Ethical memes don't randomly mutate or come into being full-formed. The victors look at why they won and why their opponent lost and adjust accordingly, which is more in line with the quote.
Why is it partly consequentialism? In what sense did consequentialism have any causal role to play in the development of deontological ethical systems? I highly doubt that the people who developed and promulgated them were closet consequentialists who chose the rules based on their consequences.