[extropy-chat] Are ancestor simulations immoral?

[Anne-Marie Taylor]

Jef Allbright <jef at jefallbright.net> wrote:
   
  When the Buddha said that all life is suffering, he was stating a more fundamental truth, that all 
  life involves gradients that must be continuously overcome.  It would be a misunderstanding to think one could eliminate the gradients of life, but it is a great understanding to acknowledge and
  accept this and thus eliminate subjective suffering from the internal model while continuing to function in the world. 
   
  Are you saying that Buddha's truth is based on his own mistakes and that based
  on those mistakes or his own truths he became wise?  (Wise meaning learning from his
  mistakes or truths and changing truths and ofcourse becoming a legend:)
   
  Very confused but still curious?
  Anna:)
   
   
   
  

 
  On 5/27/06, Lee Corbin <lcorbin at tsoft.com> wrote:    Jef Albright writes  (hi Jef!)

> 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.

> 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.

Actually, I agree totally with *both* of these propositions. As
Anders say, the creation of life (say, as opposed to vacuum) is
good. And as Pearce writes, happiness is intrinsically good 
www.hedweb.com.  

(1) The creation of any particular instance of life is not necessarily good.  Supporting examples include diseases and pathological structures at the individual and social levels.  With regard to life as a process we can agree that the process tends to lead to good by virtue (!) of natural selection and the resultant growth of that which tends to work over increasing scope.  From our position within that process, we cannot but see this as tending toward the good.  For those who simplify this to "life is extropic, therefore good", I agree, but again this is referring to the process and not any particular instance. 

In your example of a person who briefly passes into and out of existence in a nanosecond, such existence carries no moral weight whatsoever because there are no consequences whatsoever.  The implication that it is a person and therefore could be ourself, is irrelevant.  As discussed extensively on this list and elsewhere, if we were in fact living in a simulated universe and it were being switched on or off, at whatever duty-cycle, there would be no way to know and no reason to care -- from within the system. 

So on to happiness and suffering.

(2) Happiness functions as an indicator of progress toward goals, and for that reason it tends to correspond with what is considered good (what is seen to work over increasing scope.)  But to confuse an indicator of progress with progress itself is like confusing a map with the territory and the eventual results are not good (they don't work very well.)   Similarly, we can subvert the process and create a feeling of happiness directly by technical means, but this too is not an an intrinsic good, only a subjective one of limited context, and obviously not something that promotes growth of what works over increasing scope.  

When the Buddha said that all life is suffering, he was stating a more fundamental truth, that all life involves gradients that must be continuously overcome.  It would be a misunderstanding to think one could eliminate the gradients of life, but it is a great understanding to acknowledge and accept this and thus eliminate subjective suffering from the internal model while continuing to function in the world. 

I think we can agree that being blissfully incapacitated is not morally superior to striving (and therefore tolerating some suffering) to promote ones values.

<snip>



  > 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.

Au contraire!  As opposed to the default (say vacuum) I heartily
approve of any kind of benefit, including drug induced states of
blissful incapacitation. I even approve of those states relative 
to states of unrelieved misery. And, as always "intrinsically
good" means merely "I approve".  



  "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean--nether more nor less."
  "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
  "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be the master--that's all." 

- Jef
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