<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"
http-equiv="Content-Type">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
On 11/09/2012 21:13, spike wrote:<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:010f01cd9059$e2765f70$a7631e50$@att.net"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">Come on extro-ethics hipsters,
think hard, suggest the right answers, and while you are at it, do again
make the case that ethical behavior and intelligence are related please?</pre>
</blockquote>
There is a link *in humans* between smarts and having a lower
discount rate: you value the far future more if you can foresee
consequences better. Smarter people also are better at cooperating
in prisoner's dilemma situations since they can figure out the value
of cooperation. But as we have been arguing from our horizon, this
is no guarantee that super-smart systems will be nice.<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.nickbostrom.com/superintelligentwill.pdf">http://www.nickbostrom.com/superintelligentwill.pdf</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://lesswrong.com/lw/cej/general_purpose_intelligence_arguing_the/">http://lesswrong.com/lw/cej/general_purpose_intelligence_arguing_the/</a><br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://philosophicaldisquisitions.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/bostrom-on-superintelligence-and.html">http://philosophicaldisquisitions.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/bostrom-on-superintelligence-and.html</a><br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:010f01cd9059$e2765f70$a7631e50$@att.net"
type="cite">
Heh. All ethical dilemmas seem to pale in comparison to those
presented to
the families of Alzheimer's patients.
For instance, imagine an AD patient who seems partially OK some
mornings for
the most part, but nearly every afternoon and evening tends to
grow more and
more agitated, confused, lost, terrified, angry, worried,
combative, clearly
not enjoying life. But the patient sometimes has a good day, and
on those
occasions clearly states a preference to stay in their own home
until there
is nothing left of the brain. When is it time to check the patient
into
elder care? Easy, right? OK what if the patient's spouse is doing
something wrong in
the medication, such as giving the patient large doses of useless
vitamins,
on pure faith since Paul Harvey said they are good for this or
that? What
if you come to suspect the patient is receiving sleep aids in the
middle of
the day, and the rest of the family doesn't know? What is the
right thing
to do there? Ignore one's own suspicion and go along, knowing that
if a
patient is suffering, well hell, it isn't suffering to be asleep,
ja?
Apparently AD doesn't hurt in the sense that it causes pain, so it
doesn't
keep one awake as something like arthritis would, but the
suffering is real.
If a spouse decided the person is better off sleeping most of the
time, is
it appropriate to second-guess that spouse? </blockquote>
<br>
If I were to pretend to be a proper practical ethicist I would
reason somewhat like this: There are some moral principles that are
fairly robust, they emerge almost no matter what normal ethical
system you use. In medicine the "classic" list is <br>
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_ethics#cite_note-7"><span></span></a>
<ul>
<li>Respect for <a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomy#Medicine"
title="Autonomy">autonomy</a> - the patient has the right to
refuse or choose their treatment. (<i>Voluntas aegroti suprema
lex</i>.)</li>
<li><a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beneficence_%28ethics%29"
title="Beneficence (ethics)">Beneficence</a> - a practitioner
should act in the best interest of the patient. (<i>Salus
aegroti suprema lex</i>.)</li>
<li>Non-maleficence - "first, do no harm" (<i><a
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primum_non_nocere"
title="Primum non nocere">primum non nocere</a></i>).</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_%28ethics%29"
title="Justice (ethics)">Justice</a> - concerns the
distribution of scarce health resources, and the decision of who
gets what treatment (fairness and equality).</li>
</ul>
And then people often like to add respect for the person (sometimes
solemnly dressed up as human dignity) and truthfulness as other key
values. <br>
<br>
Now, AD is bad for autonomy. Not all decisions are made in a
rational way or using all available facts - but as you say, it
varies from day to day. So clearly one needs to listen to what the
patient wants. But sometimes the beneficience principle gets
stronger weight. And when in doubt, one needs to be careful not to
do harm. <br>
<br>
Note that AD doesn't break up personal identity. Sure, memory is
being lost and personality changes, but it is not as if the person
is a sequence of independent identities. Hence earlier sensible
decisions about one's future still hold moral weight and should be
respected: if they want to stay at home as long as possible, fine.
(That might of course be limited by the rights and considerations of
the family: one should not follow all commands of a sick family
member, no matter how loved. Other family members also need to have
lives!) <br>
<br>
The vitamin pills are likely not harmful (unless they are very
expensive), so if that keeps the spouse happy that they are doing
something or even provides placebo, there is little harm there. One
might quibble about whether accepting one near-superstition opens up
for other, more harmful remedies or bad epistemic practices, but it
seems to be relatively minor. <br>
<br>
The sleep aids, now that is different. That seems to break the
autonomy principle rather badly, even if it is for the good of the
patient. And if they are given secretly, then there are issues both
with truthfulness and risk: some sleep aids might interact with
other medications. It would be much better to discuss this with the
patient when they are lucid and get them to explain what they want.
This might be harder than it seems, because over time paranoia and
other personality changes might make them want something different,
at which point hard decisions about whether they are still capable
enough to overrule past decisions come in. And talking it over with
the spouse is of course hard in itself (still, one should not
underestimate the burden of keeping things secret from one's own
family).<br>
<br>
In this case I think the principles do a bit of useful work, but
obviously far more hinges on being a sensible person who can manage
to talk about hard things in a sad situation. <br>
<br>
Armchair ethicists might of course suggest more radical things (the
Kantian: lying is *always* wrong! the utilitarian: maximize
happiness, go for the sedatives and happy pills! the contractarian:
follow whatever rules the AMA has published!) but for some reason
they are not very common in real moral situations (no meta-ethicist
in a foxhole?)<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Anders Sandberg,
Future of Humanity Institute
Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University </pre>
</body>
</html>