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All of melthengylf's Comments + Replies

Politics is the Mind-Killer
melthengylf-20

I discharge number 3 and number 4 objection, as a situation where the problem is ill-defined. That is, the ammount of knowledge supposed to have is inverosimile or unkown. And yes, I think the fat guy case is a case of an ethical injunction. But doesn't it slip the predictive power of consequentialism? It may not. I'm more concerned on the problems written below.

I do think you should act for a better outcome. I disagree in completeness and transitiveness of values. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory#Other_assumptions That's the cause that ... (read more)

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The_Duck150

Thirdly, it regards the action as an one-time action. But just it isn't. If you teach .people to push the fat guy to kill it. You just not only will have three people less dead. You'll also have a bunch of emotionless people who think it is ok to kill people if it is for the greater good. Fourthly, people don't always come immediately to the truth. You can't say you should kill the fat guy if you really think that's gonna save the other people.

These objections suggest that you are actually applying consequentialism already! You are worrying that other ... (read more)

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1Incorrect
Of course, the brain isn't perfect. The fact that humans can't always or even can't usually apply truths doesn't make them untrue. Pressing a button kills one person, not pressing the button kills two people. utility(1 death) + utility(1 death) < utility(1 death) Assuming it's bad to teach consequentialism to people doesn't make consequentialism wrong. It's bad to teach people how to make bombs but that doesn't mean the knowledge to create bombs is incorrect. See Ethical Injunctions Such thought experiments often make unlikely assumptions such as perfect knowledge of consequences. That doesn't make the conclusions of those thought experiments wrong, it just constrains them to unlikely situations. Qualitative analysis is still computable. If humans can do something it is computable. Solomonoff induction is a formalized model of prediction of future events.