Eneasz comments on The Bedrock of Fairness - Less Wrong

25 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 03 July 2008 06:00AM

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Comment author: Eneasz 04 July 2008 07:19:00AM 0 points [-]

Joe Mathes: I thought it was fairly obvious that a fair distribution is in this case synonymous with a moral distribution (was I wrong?). In this context, the word fair doesn't have any meaning if one tries to remove the concept of morality.

However I don't think that argueing for fairness when one is not the beneficiary is that unusual. The civil rights movement was supported by a lot of white people, and the women's liberation movement was supported by a lot of males. In both cases these people are losing an advantage they previously held in order to preserve fairness, which they viewed as more valuable than their advantages. I think they're right, of course, but people are rarely motivated by abstract arguements about society as a whole being better off. They are motivated by a love of fairness and a desire to promote fairness, which has been inculcated into them by their programmers. A desire strong enough to override their desire for advantages over the oppressed group.