From: Brett Paatsch (bpaatsch@bigpond.net.au)
Date: Fri Jul 25 2003 - 07:29:12 MDT
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky writes:
> Lee Corbin wrote:
> >
> >>when he raised nuclear genocide as a possible
> > > rational and *morally preferable* option was
> > > the revolted reaction of a friend who, out of
> > > politeness, did not wish to say publicly
> >> what Eliezer said: `Are you autistic?'
> >
> > That's a pretty dumb question! Like your
> > probable remarks, it does far more to connote
> > a frame of mind (a rather deplorable frame of
> > mind IMO) than it does to advance rational
> > discussion.
>
> Perhaps it does not advance rational discussion.
> It was a serious question, though.
I took Robert's question to be serious.
> The disconnect between the words being verbally
> manipulated into sentence streams, and all affect,
> emotion, intuitive visualization, was large enough
> to make me start wondering about Robert's
> sanity, or at least such small sanity as humans
> are supposed to have.
Gees, Eliezer, Robert puts a serious question (by
*your* account), you write 'are you autistic' and
then despite the fact that Robert has not stated
anything further on the matter in this thread you're
still talking as though Robert's sanity is something
you seriously doubt and/or are in a position to pass
judgement on. I think your have now surpassed
Robert in the faux pas count.
There are some very important and worthwhile issues
behind the screens of political correctness and even
intelligent people need to be able to make a mistake
occassionally if those issues are to be explored and
solutions illuminated.
> The Hiroshima bomber crew did not, contrary to
> legend, have nightmares about it. They flew back,
> Truman told them that he took responsibility, and
> that was that. Can you imagine if they'd had to
> walk along a line of seventy thousand people and,
> one by one, slit their throats - let alone being forced
> to burn them in fire?
Truthfully, I can't, or rather I probably could to ceertain
degree but I don't want to (not 70,000 unique individuals
in the full or near full detail of their individual humanity).
I probably could imagine quite a few if I had good reason
to and probably, though I am not sure of this, so could you.
Still, the point about triage is a valid and an important one.
There are people in the world that do have the power to
make decisions that will determine the fates of far more
individuals than they will have the time to personally
consider as individual instances of humanity in detail.
Politicans must do it, generals must do it. There is no
escaping the need to triage for some of us who are rational.
To not take responsibility simply leaves the responsibility to
others. The point surely then becomes how to triage well.
How to minimize pain or loss and this must be done with
a certain level of detachment or the problem at issue is not
what one is considering.
> One by one, letting each soldier
> or man or woman or schoolchild finish dying before
> moving on to the next? They would not have gotten
> past the first ten, they would have had nightmares for
> the rest of their lives, and if Truman told them he
> "accepted full responsibility" it would have been a
> pathetic, useless token.
Did *you* actually imagine 10 Eliezer? If so, in how
much detail? It seems to me that you are either doing
what Robert did by painting an unpleasant scenario to
explore an important question or you are just blowing
gas.
> Dave Grossman is exactly right; technological distance
> is emotional distance. Bomber crews don't have
> nightmares because they wield buttons instead of
> knives, though the suffering they cause is vastly greater.
And you know this *how*?
>
> Robert Bradbury has no goddamn idea what the words
> coming out of his mouth actually mean. That much is
> clear.
No it is not.
> And similarly the people who dropped the bomb on
> Hiroshima had no goddamn idea what that button
> actually did, regardless of what verbal ideas were
> floating around in their heads. Hugo de Garis has no
> goddamn idea of what a 'gigadeath' 'artilect war' would
> involve, and Ben Goertzel has no goddamn idea that
> AI is an existential risk, regardless of what words they
> put down on paper. Being unable to relate abstract
> verbal thought to negative affect is not a charming
> personal quirk.
Seriously, do you think you are making an argument or
do you realise that you are preaching a sort of gospel
according to EY?
> Robert is just emotionally disconnected from the results
> of what he's saying, not evil; he has no idea that he might
> be doing something wrong, though he realizes in a distant
> way that he ought to acknowledge the possibility. But
> y'know, by golly, I bet that when all the bodies are counted
> up across the galaxies, it's the Roberts and not the Hitlers
> who account for most of the planetary kills.
I'd like to take that bet. Precisely how do you propose that
we operationalise it?
> There comes a point where stupidity stops being innocent,
This I agree with.
> and it doesn't really matter anymore whether you have to
> be emotionally evil as well as verbally evil to genuinely be
> a bad person.
This is an unsubstatiated thesis.
> I think that line is crossed when you start talking about the
> use of nuclear weapons to commit genocide against those
> darn foreigners because paying attention would be too
> inconvenient.
I think a line is crossed when people can't tell the difference
between an abstract discussion and concrete actions. I
thought Robert was trying to have an abstract discussion
on an important issue. You, if you are to be taken at your
words concluded quite a lot more was going on.
Perhaps we need a new subject header class [adults only].
Brett Paatsch
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