TheOtherDave comments on [SEQ RERUN] The Bedrock of Morality: Arbitrary? - Less Wrong Discussion
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Loading…
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (25)
I'm >.9 confident that EY would agree that with you that, supposing we do inherently value well-being and cooperation, we would not if we had not evolved to do so.
I'm >.8 confident that EY would also say that valuing well-being and cooperation (in addition to other things, some of which might be more important) is right, or perhaps right, and not just "h-right".
For my own part, I think "inherently" is a problematic word here. A sufficiently sophisticated paperclip maximizer would agree that cooperation is a Good Move, in that it can be used to increase the rate of paperclip production. I agree that cooperation is a Good Move in roughly the same way.
I agree that EY would say both those things. I did not mean to contradict either in my comment.
That is part of what I was trying to convey with the word 'inherently'. The other part is that I think EY would say that humans do value some forms of cooperation, such as friendship, inherently, in addition to their instrumental value. I am, however, a bit less confident of that than of the things I have said about EY's metaethical views.
Most variants of h-morality inherently value those things. Many other moralities also value those things. That does not make them objectively better than their absence. Note that the presence of values in a specified morality is a factual question, not a moral one.
Whether or not h-morality h-should value cooperation and friendship inherently is a null question. H-moralities h-should be whatever they are, by definition. Whether or not h-morality o-should do so is a question that requires understanding o-morality to answer.