Joseph_Knecht comments on The "Intuitions" Behind "Utilitarianism" - Less Wrong

29 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 28 January 2008 04:29PM

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Comment author: Joseph_Knecht 29 January 2008 11:23:41AM 2 points [-]

Thanks for the explanations, Bob.

Bob: The point of using 3^^^3 is to avoid the need to assign precise values... Once you accept the premise that A is less than B (with both being finite and nonzero), you need to accept that there exists some number k where kA is greater than B.

This still requires that they are commensurable though, which is what seeking a strong argument for. Saying that 3^^^3 dust specks in 3^^^3 eyes is greater harm than 50 years of torture means that they are commensurable and that whatever the utilities are, 3^^^3 specks divided by 50 years of torture is greater than 1.0. I don't see that they are commensurable. A < B < C < D doesn't imply that there's some k such that kA>D.

Consider: I prefer Bach to Radiohead (though I love both). That doesn't imply that there's some ratio of Bach to Radiohead, or that I think a certain number of Radiohead songs are collectively better than or more desirable than, for example, the d-minor partita. Even if I did in some cases believe that 10 Radiohead songs were worth 1 Bach prelude and fugue, that would just be my subjective feeling. I don't see why there must be an objective ratio, and I can't see grounds for saying what such a ratio would be. Likewise for dust-specks and torture.

Like Mitchell, I would like to see exactly how people propose to assign these ratios such that a certan number of one harm is greater than a radically different harm.