Ian_C. comments on Ends Don't Justify Means (Among Humans) - Less Wrong

44 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 14 October 2008 09:00PM

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Comment author: Ian_C. 15 October 2008 06:01:59PM 0 points [-]

I don't think it's possible that our hardware could trick us in this way (making us doing self-interested things by making them appear moral).

To express the idea "this would be good for the tribe" would require the use of abstract concepts (tribe, good) but abstract concepts/sentences are precisely the things that are observably under our conscious control. What *can* pop up without our willing it are feelings or image associations so the best trickery our hardware could hope for is to make something feel good.