[extropy-chat] Are ancestor simulations immoral?

[Jef Allbright]

On 5/27/06, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at tsoft.com> wrote:
>
> Really, it's all very silly. Clearly no one is actually having
> any harm come to them. So what if a person briefly passes into
> and out of existence in a nanosecond?  Instead of worrying about
> the fantastic numbers of "deaths", worry instead about happiness
> and suffering.
>
>
Lee -

Some individuals on this list would argue that the creation of sentient life
is an intrinsic (extropic) good, and destroying that same life is therefore
bad.  Others would argue, as you seem to imply and in accord with Pearce's
hedonistic imperative, that happiness and suffering are intrinsically good
and bad respectively.  I would argue against both of these positions and say
that none of these are intrinsically good or bad, but can only be evaluated
relative to some set of subjective values, which fortunately for society we
hold in common to some extent.

I expect that you have already thought this through in some depth, but I
would not like to leave standing the impression that happiness without
meaning (such as a drug-induced state of blissful incapacitation) would be
intrinsically good or that suffering is intrinsically bad.

- Jef
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20060527/f1e568a4/attachment.html>