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Raemon comments on A variant on the trolley problem and babies as unit of currency - Less Wrong Discussion

9 Post author: Solvent 08 January 2012 08:13AM

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Comment author: Raemon 08 January 2012 11:30:46PM *  2 points [-]

I think if you value net-happiness it's still not a shame, although it may be a shame if you value median-preference-satisfaction.

Comment author: Kingreaper 10 January 2012 06:40:57PM -1 points [-]

There are arguments that valuing net-happiness IN OUR CURRENT WORLD means you'd want to increase the human population.

However, in an arbitrary world, where wealth-production correlates with human population, there's no reason to assume that net-happiness would also correlate with wealth-production.

IOW: his conclusion (it's not a shame) has a truth value that depends on value system, but his reasoning is true only if you have one, very specific, value system (you value near-future-wealth-production as your terminal value)