I think that the relationship between (number of deaths) and (amount of despair/psychological impact) isn't linear, and differs depending on the psychological proximity that one has to the act of killing. For a very abstract example, let's say that killing in person has a square-root relationship with psychological impact; killing 10,000 people is about ten times as psyche-breaking as killing 100 people. Even that is probably inexact for small numbers; the multiplicative difference between killing 1 person vs 100 people, and killing 100 people vs 10,000 people, might well be different. Killing but button, however, may have a logarithmic relationship: it's only three times as bad to kill 1,000,000 people as it is to kill 1,000.

Additionally, consider why such a good and decent officer might kill: because in the moment, he is convinced of the righteousness of his cause. He begins full of fervor, but as the act continues, he may grow weary, or the hormones which contributed to his enthusiasm may wear off, as the killing stretches long into the night. He may question if killing this next person is strictly necessary, or if maybe, just maybe, he could stop at 69,000, or let that child live while killing everyone after him.

I don't doubt that there are killers for whom killing again is easier - pyschopaths, certainly, and relatively psychologically normal people who are convinced of the inhumanity of their enemies - but we are talking about a good and decent officers, killing civillians for the greater good. There are some similarities, but there are also a great many differences.

Your solution is to abandon every Babyeater baby who exists now, and every one which will exist in the future, the population of which will grow at an exponential rate as the Babyeaters explore their home starline -- possibly an actual infinite number of babies -- to a hellishly slow death by gradual digestion, for the sake of the however many mere billions of humans currently exist?

2) Honestly, I would have been happy with the aliens' deal (even before it was implemented), and I think there is a ~60% chance that Elizier agrees.

I'm of the opinion that pain is a bad thing, except insofar as it prevents you from damaging yourself. People argue that pain is necessary to provide contrast to happiness, and that pleasure wouldn't be meaningful without pain, but I would say that boredom and slight discomfort provide more than enough contrast.

However, this future society disagrees. The idea that "pain is important" is ingrained in these people's minds, in much the same way that "rape is bad" is ingrained in ours. I think one of the main points Elizier is trying to make is that we would disagree with future humans almost as much as we would disagree with the baby-eaters or superhappies.

(Edit 1.5 years later: I was exaggerating in that second paragraph. I suspect I was trying too hard to sound insightful. The claims may or may not have merit, but I would no longer word them as forcefully.)

Really? In that case, please translate the word "naches" from Yiddish to English in one word.