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NancyLebovitz comments on [POLITICS] Jihadism and a new kind of existential threat - Less Wrong Discussion
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To be fair:
a) If advancedatheist was the leader of the US, and people would follow him, he probably could conquer or kill a billion through technological superiority without too much difficulty. Guerilla warfare might be less of a problem if, after an insurgent attack, all males of fighting age nearby had their first two fingers cut off, to act as both a deterent against future attacks and to stop them pulling triggers. Brutal? Yes, by modern standards, but very civilised compared to say, imperial Japan.
b) Are rationalist consequentialists meant to view empathy as anything other than 'warm fuzzies' which should be endorsed enough to stay sane, but otherwise ignored?
EDIT: Am I trying to say that empathy is wrong, or am I employing the Socratic method? Who knows?
I think we've seen some evidence lately that killing is easy, conquest is hard.
In addition to warm fuzzies, empathy is a shorthand for realizing that other people care about their own interests and are more likely to cooperate and less likely to defect if you have some care for their interest.
If we're going into game theory here, then surely what you want to be signalling is not that you will cooperate, but that you will cooperate iff they cooperate?
Of course, ISIS have already defected, but that doesn't generalise to all of the other billion people.
You don't want to have a habit of defecting first, and that's what empathy can protect you from.
How very postrationalist of you :)