I know, I'm one of the last holdouts regarding global warming. :)
I agree that the earth is warming. As for the human cause, well, maybe. As for the dire consequences predicted, I'm skeptical.
A few things annoy me about global warming alarmists. One is their degree of certainty vs. the soundness of their evidence. We understand very little about global climate cycles. Another is their tendency to ignore contradicting evidence.
So my basic position is that this work understanding global climate must be done, and very quickly, and that I haven't had the evidence for anthropogenic global warming and catastrophic consequences presented to me in a way that gave me great confidence.
I skimmed it. Occasionally I read the rebuttals, Lomborg's counter-arguments, and his critics' counter-rebuttals. Alas, I do not have time to become an expert in environmental science. But what Lomborg says seems to make an awful lot of sense.
The global warming debate reminds me of the abortion debate. The arguments coming from both sides are either terrible, or very inconclusive.
Alonzo Fyfe is one of the few people who makes coherent arguments about abortion, and Bjorn Lomborg may be one of the few people who make coherent arguments about global warming.
But I could be totally misreading the global warming situation, which is why my response to Lomborg is "wait and see" rather than "Hero!"
...and I'm curious to see what the world will think of Bjorn Lomborg 200 years from now. Assuming we figure out how to digitize human consciousness in my lifetime.
Wow, just discovered E.T. Jaynes. Too bad he died in 1998, or he'd surely make this list. I wonder if, at the end of the 21st century, we'll recognize his Probability Theory as one of the most important texts of the century?
Is the new site going to handle long threaded conversations any better? For example, this discussion between AJ and I has squished itself up against the right margin, and continues to expand the width of the page.
Let me quote Alonzo Fyfe on why value comes from desire:
In order for something (S) to have direct value it must be the case that there is a desire that P, and P is true of S. S has indirect value if S has a tendency to bring about T, there is a desire that P, and P is true of T.
All desire utilitarianism does is take the two ways in which something can have value – direct value in terms of being such as to fulfill a desire, and indirect value in terms of being such as to bring about a state that fulfills a desire – and applies this method to desires themselves. Desires also have value in virtue of the degree to which they are desired, or the degree to which they are likely to bring about states that are desired.
That's all there is to it! Very simple.
Now, what about happiness utilitarianism? Let me list some of the problems:
1. There is no clear reason to say that happiness is "better" than, say, preference satisfaction or pleasure or extropy.
2. We do not all pursue happiness above all else. Consider the following scenario:
A mad scientist has taken you, and somebody you care a great deal about, prisoner. He gives you two options, and demands that you pick one.
Option 1: The person you care about is to be set free, in good health, and with enough wealth to take care of his needs for the foreseeable future. He has been unconscious the whole time, so he will not remember anything about what happened to you. He will be given reason to believe that you are safe and happy. Your memory will also be erased, and we will give you every reason to believe that this person is being tortured mercilessly. You will hear the screams. Other than this, you will be well fed and cared for and given as much freedom as we can allow.
Option 2: The person you care about will be taken to another island, where he will be mercilessly tortured. However, you will not hear the screams. Your memory will be erased, and we will give you every reason to believe that this person is living a healthy and happy life. You will be convinced that he is well. In addition, you will be well fed and cared for and given as much freedom as we can allow.
Most people say they would choose option 1, even though it will not make them happiest.
We have many other projects besides our own happiness. That is, we desire many things besides happiness. Truth, for example. In many situation we would rather know the truth than live a comforting delusion in which we are happiest.
3. Happiness theory cannot explain why two people with identical beliefs might choose two different options. To explain this we must resort to a mysterious third variable that differs between them - a variable that is not part of happiness theory.
4. Consider the ultimate happiness machine. You plug your brain into it and it reads what makes you happy and makes you think you are experiencing all of that. This machine can bring ultimate happiness to everybody. And yet many people will not choose the happiness machine, because it does not actually fulfill their desires: that is, it does not make true the states of affairs that they desire. The machine can fulfill my desire for happiness, but it thwarts many of my other desires.
Yeah, the problem with really old thinkers like Pythagoras is that we're not sure what they invented and how much they just summarized other people whose writings have been lost. It's quite possible that Euclid or especially Aristotle merely summarized earlier discoveries in math and logic (consider our snippets of data from Pythagoras and Zeno, for example). So it's quite possible that Pythagoras was more important than Euclid, but all I can do is say "as far as we know..."
From the information we do have, Aristotle and Euclid are more important than Pythagoras. But perhaps he'll find a spot lower on the list...
Perhaps you're starting to see why it is said that "Utilitarianism dies the death of a thousand qualification." To have utilitarian theories make sense you have to insert thousands of arbitrary qualification. Imagine if Einstein had had to insert hundreds of arbitrary cosmological constants in to his theory of general relativity!
But desire utilitarianism is different than "common utilitarianism," and all other theories. As far as I can tell, it's actually coherent.
Thanks for the stimulating discussion. I'll try to revisit your earlier questions in applied ethics sometime.
"intrinsic value means something that is an goal worth attaining for the sake of humanity."
First, why on earth would "intrinsic value" be limited to human interests?
Second, what is "worth attaining" for humanity's sake? What makes happiness "worth attaining" rather than preference satisfaction, pleasure, extropy, intelligence, virtuosity, power, simplicity, or pumpkins?
Don't tell me it's because we'd be "better off", because that's question-begging. That's what we're trying to figure out. What is "better"? Why should we think happiness is better than a pile of pumpkins? Why should we think literacy is better than unity? Do some of these things have more "intrinsic value" than the other? If so, what is this "intrinsic value" you speak of (without being circular)? What do you measure it with?
Every desire is not a desire for happiness. For example, parents often sacrifice happiness (or their own lives) so that their children will have a chance to live. Or, certain people give up happiness in lieu of something they deem more important (like extropy).
But maybe I'm attacking straw men, since I'm unclear on your theory. Are you saying that happiness has intrinsic value and should be maximized, and so the right act is one that maximizes happiness? If so, that is "happiness utilitarianism," and I can more easily explain all the problems with that theory. If not, please clarify your position.
"In any case, I still don't see how the goal of fulfilling more and greater desires seems like it has more referent in the real world to you than increasing happiness. I'm also not sure that desires are the end-all be-all explanation of human behavior (don't you ever do things for what seems like no good reason?)."
You seem to think I'm saying that "fulfilling more and greater desires" has intrinsic value, and should be maximized. Emphatically, I'm not saying this. What I'm saying is that morality is about reasons for action, desires are the only reasons for action that exist, and each desire creates its own reason for action.
Desires do indeed have a referent in the real world. A desire is a brain state. In philosophy-speak, it is a type of "propositional attitude." There are two types of propositional attitudes: beliefs and desires. A ‘belief that P’ is a mental attitude that the proposition P is true. A ‘desire that P’ is a mental attitude that the proposition P is to be made or kept true. And this mental attitude is a brain state that exists in the real world.
Contrast this with "intrinsic value," which I still haven't heard how to find in the real world. It seems to have no referent.
As for the "end-all be-all explanation of human behavior," that's a slightly different matter, one for psychologists to work out. Humans act on intentions, which are formed on the basis of beliefs and desires. If I believe there is a dragon down the street that will eat me, and I desire to not be eaten, I will intend to run the other way, and do so. If I believe there is a dragon down the street that will eat me, but I desire to be eaten, I will intend to run toward it, and do so. If I desire to not be eaten, but do not believe there is anything that will eat me down the street, I will probably just keep walking down the street.
"don't you ever do things for what seems like no reason"?
Certainly, we sometimes do not know our own desires, since a great many desires are unconscious. But we always act so as to fulfill our desires (because that's part of the definition of a "desire"). Our desires may be "selfish" or "selfless" or neither, but we always act such as to fulfill our desires.
Scaruffi is now taking interns.
I know, I'm one of the last holdouts regarding global warming. :)
I agree that the earth is warming. As for the human cause, well, maybe. As for the dire consequences predicted, I'm skeptical.
A few things annoy me about global warming alarmists. One is their degree of certainty vs. the soundness of their evidence. We understand very little about global climate cycles. Another is their tendency to ignore contradicting evidence.
So my basic position is that this work understanding global climate must be done, and very quickly, and that I haven't had the evidence for anthropogenic global warming and catastrophic consequences presented to me in a way that gave me great confidence.
I skimmed it. Occasionally I read the rebuttals, Lomborg's counter-arguments, and his critics' counter-rebuttals. Alas, I do not have time to become an expert in environmental science. But what Lomborg says seems to make an awful lot of sense.
The global warming debate reminds me of the abortion debate. The arguments coming from both sides are either terrible, or very inconclusive.
Alonzo Fyfe is one of the few people who makes coherent arguments about abortion, and Bjorn Lomborg may be one of the few people who make coherent arguments about global warming.
But I could be totally misreading the global warming situation, which is why my response to Lomborg is "wait and see" rather than "Hero!"
...and I'm curious to see what the world will think of Bjorn Lomborg 200 years from now. Assuming we figure out how to digitize human consciousness in my lifetime.
Wow, just discovered E.T. Jaynes. Too bad he died in 1998, or he'd surely make this list. I wonder if, at the end of the 21st century, we'll recognize his Probability Theory as one of the most important texts of the century?
Black Swan is good, but unfortunately it is long and poorly edited. There are probably some media summaries of his work that will do you just fine.
hahahaha
Mashups in classical music.
heyrocker,
Is the new site going to handle long threaded conversations any better? For example, this discussion between AJ and I has squished itself up against the right margin, and continues to expand the width of the page.
Let me quote Alonzo Fyfe on why value comes from desire:
That's all there is to it! Very simple.
Now, what about happiness utilitarianism? Let me list some of the problems:
1. There is no clear reason to say that happiness is "better" than, say, preference satisfaction or pleasure or extropy.
2. We do not all pursue happiness above all else. Consider the following scenario:
Most people say they would choose option 1, even though it will not make them happiest.
We have many other projects besides our own happiness. That is, we desire many things besides happiness. Truth, for example. In many situation we would rather know the truth than live a comforting delusion in which we are happiest.
3. Happiness theory cannot explain why two people with identical beliefs might choose two different options. To explain this we must resort to a mysterious third variable that differs between them - a variable that is not part of happiness theory.
4. Consider the ultimate happiness machine. You plug your brain into it and it reads what makes you happy and makes you think you are experiencing all of that. This machine can bring ultimate happiness to everybody. And yet many people will not choose the happiness machine, because it does not actually fulfill their desires: that is, it does not make true the states of affairs that they desire. The machine can fulfill my desire for happiness, but it thwarts many of my other desires.
5. Happiness theory cannot account for the incommensurability of value.
Yup, that seems most sensible.
One possibility would be to just make the indentation smaller.
Yeah, the problem with really old thinkers like Pythagoras is that we're not sure what they invented and how much they just summarized other people whose writings have been lost. It's quite possible that Euclid or especially Aristotle merely summarized earlier discoveries in math and logic (consider our snippets of data from Pythagoras and Zeno, for example). So it's quite possible that Pythagoras was more important than Euclid, but all I can do is say "as far as we know..."
From the information we do have, Aristotle and Euclid are more important than Pythagoras. But perhaps he'll find a spot lower on the list...
Sure.
Perhaps you're starting to see why it is said that "Utilitarianism dies the death of a thousand qualification." To have utilitarian theories make sense you have to insert thousands of arbitrary qualification. Imagine if Einstein had had to insert hundreds of arbitrary cosmological constants in to his theory of general relativity!
But desire utilitarianism is different than "common utilitarianism," and all other theories. As far as I can tell, it's actually coherent.
Thanks for the stimulating discussion. I'll try to revisit your earlier questions in applied ethics sometime.
"intrinsic value means something that is an goal worth attaining for the sake of humanity."
First, why on earth would "intrinsic value" be limited to human interests?
Second, what is "worth attaining" for humanity's sake? What makes happiness "worth attaining" rather than preference satisfaction, pleasure, extropy, intelligence, virtuosity, power, simplicity, or pumpkins?
Don't tell me it's because we'd be "better off", because that's question-begging. That's what we're trying to figure out. What is "better"? Why should we think happiness is better than a pile of pumpkins? Why should we think literacy is better than unity? Do some of these things have more "intrinsic value" than the other? If so, what is this "intrinsic value" you speak of (without being circular)? What do you measure it with?
Every desire is not a desire for happiness. For example, parents often sacrifice happiness (or their own lives) so that their children will have a chance to live. Or, certain people give up happiness in lieu of something they deem more important (like extropy).
But maybe I'm attacking straw men, since I'm unclear on your theory. Are you saying that happiness has intrinsic value and should be maximized, and so the right act is one that maximizes happiness? If so, that is "happiness utilitarianism," and I can more easily explain all the problems with that theory. If not, please clarify your position.
"In any case, I still don't see how the goal of fulfilling more and greater desires seems like it has more referent in the real world to you than increasing happiness. I'm also not sure that desires are the end-all be-all explanation of human behavior (don't you ever do things for what seems like no good reason?)."
You seem to think I'm saying that "fulfilling more and greater desires" has intrinsic value, and should be maximized. Emphatically, I'm not saying this. What I'm saying is that morality is about reasons for action, desires are the only reasons for action that exist, and each desire creates its own reason for action.
Desires do indeed have a referent in the real world. A desire is a brain state. In philosophy-speak, it is a type of "propositional attitude." There are two types of propositional attitudes: beliefs and desires. A ‘belief that P’ is a mental attitude that the proposition P is true. A ‘desire that P’ is a mental attitude that the proposition P is to be made or kept true. And this mental attitude is a brain state that exists in the real world.
Contrast this with "intrinsic value," which I still haven't heard how to find in the real world. It seems to have no referent.
As for the "end-all be-all explanation of human behavior," that's a slightly different matter, one for psychologists to work out. Humans act on intentions, which are formed on the basis of beliefs and desires. If I believe there is a dragon down the street that will eat me, and I desire to not be eaten, I will intend to run the other way, and do so. If I believe there is a dragon down the street that will eat me, but I desire to be eaten, I will intend to run toward it, and do so. If I desire to not be eaten, but do not believe there is anything that will eat me down the street, I will probably just keep walking down the street.
"don't you ever do things for what seems like no reason"?
Certainly, we sometimes do not know our own desires, since a great many desires are unconscious. But we always act so as to fulfill our desires (because that's part of the definition of a "desire"). Our desires may be "selfish" or "selfless" or neither, but we always act such as to fulfill our desires.