Rain comments on The Bedrock of Morality: Arbitrary? - Less Wrong

16 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 14 August 2008 10:00PM

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Comment author: Rain 09 April 2010 08:05:12PM *  10 points [-]

My first problem (which may well be a missed inferential step) is with the assumed universality, within humanity, of a system of goals.

From what I've seen, others have the same objection; I do as well, and I have not seen an adequate response.

how is it that humans have discovered "right" while the Pebble-people have discovered only "p-right"? Even if I grant the assertion that all humans are using the same fundamental morality, and Alice and Bob would necessarily agree if they had access to the same information, how is it that humans have discovered "right" and not "h-right"?

From what I understand, everyone except Eliezer is more likely to hold the view that he found "h-right", but he seems unwilling to call it that even when pressed on the matter. It's another point on which I agree with your confusion.

as I understand it, Eliezer's morality simply says "do whatever the computation tells you to do" without offering any help on what that computation actually looks like

We don't have quite the skill to articulate it just yet, but possibly AI and neuroscience will help. If not, we might be in trouble.

As I said, I really feel like I'm missing some small, key detail or inferential step. Please, take pity on this neophyte and help me find The Way.

I assign a high probability that Eliezer is wrong, or at the least, providing a very incomplete model for metaethics. This sequence is the one I disagree with most. Personally, I think you have a good grasp of what he's said, and its weaknesses.