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Xodarap comments on A Pure Math Argument for Total Utilitarianism - Less Wrong Discussion

-5 Post author: Xodarap 27 October 2013 05:05PM

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Comment author: Xodarap 03 November 2013 01:34:55PM 1 point [-]

How about - order should be preserved if we shift the zero-point of our happiness measurement. That seems pretty common-sense. And yet it rules out total utilitarianism. (2,2,2) > (5), but (1,1,1) < (4).

The usual definition of "zero-point" is "it doesn't matter whether that person exists or not". By that definition, there is no (universal) zero-point in average utilitarianism. (2,2,0) != (2,2) etc.

By the way, it's true you can't shift by a constant in total utilitarianism, but you can scale by a constant/