Eugene comments on True Ending: Sacrificial Fire (7/8) - Less Wrong

19 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 05 February 2009 10:57AM

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Comment author: Eugene 17 December 2011 06:15:25AM 0 points [-]

The only way - at least within the strangely convenient convergence happening in the story - to remove the Babyeater compromise from the bargain is for the humans to outwit the Superhappies such that they convince the Superhappies to be official go-betweens amongst all three species. This eliminates the necessity for humans to adopt even superficial Babyeater behavior, since the two incompatible species could simply interact exclusively through the Superhappies, who would be obligated by their moral nature to keep each side in a state of peace with the other. It should be taken as a given, after all, that the Superhappies will impose the full extent of their proposed compromises on themselves. They'd theoretically be the perfect inter-species ambassadors.

That said - given the Superhappies' thinking speed, alien comprehension (plus their selfishness and unreasonable impatience, either of which could be a narrative accident) and higher technological advancement - I'm fairly confident that it would be impossible for this story's humans to outwit them.