From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Tue May 27 2003 - 18:36:42 MDT
Harvey writes
> Excellent comments, Lee! I look forward to hearing more.
Thanks a lot, Harvey! Yes, I'll get right to it.
> Yes, there is a truth to factual questions, I agree. What I meant or
> questions about goals, motives and "goodness". As you pointed out, some
> people would let a thousand criminals go free rather than execute one
> innocent. Other people rather kill a few innocents to get more criminals.
> These are goal-based decisions. I am not sure either one can be argued as
> "right" or proven logically.
Yes, it certainly seems so. But I like even better my example
about *inequality* and how people will disagree about its
distastefulness. Now if Robin, Hal, and Wei Dai are right,
then somehow this all boils down to something that can be
agreed upon by rational altruists. (!) I am still baffled
by this denouement, as are perhaps yourself and Rafal.
Who knows? Perhaps liberals overestimate how grating inequality
is to the poor, (and sympathetic), or conservative-libertarians
underestimate it. So maybe on this case they could be right.
> (This reminds me of the copy and kill question. We can agree on every
> single atom in a thought experiment and still disagree on how to label or
> evaluate what was described.)
Oh no! In that case, people who don't regard copies as selves
are merely Wrong. ;-)
Lee
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