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CellBioGuy comments on Neo-reactionaries, why are you neo-reactionary? - Less Wrong Discussion

10 Post author: Capla 17 November 2014 10:31PM

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Comment author: CellBioGuy 18 November 2014 03:07:53AM *  2 points [-]

Good point. But how does this "is" statement become an "ought"?

Comment author: [deleted] 18 November 2014 11:37:20AM 3 points [-]

You know, there are actual investigations into these things.

Comment author: CellBioGuy 18 November 2014 02:18:54PM 3 points [-]

Seeking the specific case, not the general case.

Comment author: [deleted] 19 November 2014 08:32:24AM -1 points [-]

Well, as I said in this same thread, things like egalitarianism, female rights, minority rights, etc. have been found to be normatively binding due to the falsification of the normativity of certain social structures, usually patriarchy, royalty, and religious rule. Upon finding that those things are unjustified, we revert to the default that everyone is equal simply because there needs to be a reason to ascribe difference!

Comment author: MarkYuray 19 November 2014 10:22:57AM 5 points [-]

On what grey planet are you living on that "everyone is simply equal" is the "default"?

Comment author: [deleted] 19 November 2014 12:16:52PM *  -1 points [-]

Ethically equal does not mean materially the same. For God's sakes, this is so simple and obvious there are children's books that know it.

Comment author: ChristianKl 19 November 2014 03:23:01PM 0 points [-]

God probably being the central word in that sentence.

Comment author: [deleted] 19 November 2014 03:49:07PM 0 points [-]

Pop quiz: explain to me why I should program my FAI to consider materially-different humans to have different ethical weight, to have their values and cognitive-algorithms compose differently-weighted portions of the AI's utility function.

Comment author: Azathoth123 20 November 2014 04:05:11AM 2 points [-]

Then why restrict to humans? Or animals or that matter?

Comment author: [deleted] 20 November 2014 08:22:03AM 0 points [-]

Well, frankly, because I happen to be human, and because once you get out of animals you cease to see any mental functioning that I could even call subjective valuation. Even if I'm choosing to be omnicompassionate you need to at least restrict to consciously aware creatures.

Comment author: blogospheroid 19 November 2014 05:44:31PM 1 point [-]

Not doing so might leave your AI to be vulnerable to a slower/milder version of this. Basically, if you enter a strictly egalitarian weighting, you are providing vindication to those who thoughtlessly brought out children into the world and disincentivizing, in a timeless , acausal sense, those who're acting sensibly today and restricting reproduction to children they can bring up properly.

I'm not very certain of this answer, but it is my best attempt at the qn.

Comment author: [deleted] 20 November 2014 08:20:24AM *  0 points [-]

Good grief. You know, we already have nation-states for this sort of thing. If people form coherent separate "groups", such that mixing the groups results in a zero-sum conflict over resources (including "utility function voting space"), then you just keep the groups separate in the first place.

EDIT: Ah, the correct word here is clusters.

Comment author: Azathoth123 20 November 2014 04:04:31AM 0 points [-]

Not to mention those who prosecuted and genocided ideological opponents.

Comment author: ChristianKl 19 November 2014 05:13:21PM *  1 point [-]

It's not something easy to answer. I think it might be even on MIRI's open problems list.

Comment author: MichaelAnissimov 19 November 2014 10:11:10AM 2 points [-]

This is one of the funnier things I've read this year.

Comment author: Azathoth123 20 November 2014 04:02:50AM -1 points [-]

Upon finding that those things are unjustified, we revert to the default that everyone is equal simply because there needs to be a reason to ascribe difference!

You mean like the fact that people have different strength, intelligence, personality, ability, etc.

Comment author: [deleted] 20 November 2014 08:11:30AM -1 points [-]

Those are not ethical traits. Honestly, there are arguments you could be using that you're failing to use here. Instead, you and your comrades seem to enjoy using the downvote button as a form of evidence.

Comment author: Azathoth123 19 November 2014 01:20:54AM 1 point [-]

The point is that it deflates the implicit argument that current norms are "ought"s.