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Lukas_Gloor comments on Malthusian copying: mass death of unhappy life-loving uploads - Less Wrong Discussion
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Stuart, it sounds like you think that the life of the typical animal, and of the typical human in history, were not worth living -- you'd prefer that they had never existed. Since you seem to think your own life worth living, you must see people like you as a rare exception, and may be unsure if your existence justifies all the suffering your ancestors went through to produce you. And you'd naturally be wary of a future of descendants with lives more like your ancestors' than like your own. What you'd most want from the future is to stop change enough to ensure that people very much like you continue to dominate.
If we conceive of "death" broadly, then pretty much any competitive scenario will have lots of "death", if we look at it on a large enough scale. But this hardly implies that individuals will often feel the emotional terror of an impending death - that depends far more on framing and psychology.
Why does it seem like Stuart considers his life worth living?
Because he's still alive. I'm not sure that's enough evidence though; it started me thinking about whether I found my life worth living, and I just don't know. (It's a bad subject to get me thinking about, I'll try and stop it ASAP after this post).
Right now, I'm a fat middle-aged translator who has to translate boring technical stuff. OTOH, I do have a sweet husband and a lovely cat, and the people who pay me for those translations must think they add some value to the world.
In the 56 years leading up to that, do the positives outweigh the negatives, taking into account my tendency to remember the negatives (especially the embarrassing ones) much better? I can't tell, but if someone were proposing to create another one of me, to live the life I have lived so far, I'd say: "Why on earth would you want to do that?".
That isn't to say I'm ready to commit suicide though. I do have my husband and cat, I have a holiday to look forward to, and death is probably a very nasty experience, especially a DIY one. [EDIT: fixed typo]
Revealed preference.
But some people stay alive to make the world a better place, despite considering their life not worth living. I know several people with that view.