From: Marc Geddes (marc_geddes@yahoo.co.nz)
Date: Sat Jun 05 2004 - 00:54:26 MDT
--- Mike <mikew12345@cox.net> wrote: > > >
> > >
> > > Remove humans from the universe and where is
> > > morality? You can't say
> > > the same thing about gravity. Seems to me the
> > > concept of morality is a
> > > human invention. What morality is there in
> galaxies colliding,
> > > animals in the food chain eating each other,
> etc?
> >
> > Remove humans from the universe you say? What
> about
> > any alien civilizations that might exist?
>
> Ok, remove them too. Same question.
It's not clear that postulating the removal of all
other 'sentience' from the universe is possible. My
hypothesis would be that isn't. See what Metaqualia
said.
>
> >
> > Don't be so sure there is no morality in:
> 'galaxies
> > colliding, animals in the food chain eating each
> > other'. There are theories of consciousness which
> > ascribe some degree of sentience to everything
> > (panpsychism).
> >
>
> Are you saying sentience implies morality? (And
> I'll believe rocks are
> sentient when somebody can prove it).
I would hypothesize that any degree of sentience
implies morality yes. It is certainty true that there
could be no morality in the absence of sentience.
>
> >
> > >
> > > If you were the last human alive, and the race
> would
> > > die out after you
> > > were gone, is there anything you could do to be
> > > immoral?
> >
> > Quite possibly. What about alien cilivizations
> else
> > where in the universe? Humans still living in
> > alternative branches of the quantum multiverse?
> > Humans in the past? Any other sentients that
> might
> > exist in the future? The actions taken by the
> last
> > human alive could still be related to all the
> things
> > mentioned, even if these actions only had a tiny
> > effect.
> >
> Since you so strongly want to pull more sentients
> back into the
> question, is it accurate to conclude that you feel
> absolute
> morality applies to multiple sentients but would not
> apply
> to a single sentient if it could be truly isolated
> from all
> other sentients for all time?
Yes. But my favoured theory is panpsychism (I think
there is some degree of 'sentience' in everything, so
I think that even a rock qualifies as having
sentience). My theory is thus that truly isolating a
single sentient for all time would be logically
impossible.
>
> > >
> > > To answer one of your questions, I think that
> there
> > > is no objective
> > > standard by which you can say that Ghandi is
> better
> > > than Hitler. It's
> > > only your rules of morality that tell you that
> > > Hitler is bad (and I
> > > would personally agree). But in some societies,
> the
> > > most vicious
> > > warrior gets the most honor and privilege. By
> his
> > > society, he's a hero.
> > > By their morality, he's doing everything right.
> And
> > > if you ask their
> > > opinion, they would tell you Ghandi is weak, a
> > > coward, and not someone
> > > to emulate. One obvious example of this is the
> > > Samurai in Japan a few
> > > hundred years ago. If they had to guess at the
> > > nature of the "objective
> > > morality", their guess would look nothing like
> mine.
> > > How can our
> > > moralities come from the same source and be so
> > > different?
> >
> > Are our moralitites really so totally different
> > though? Deduct out the differences and I think
> you'd
> > still find a great common of commonality.
> >
> >
> > The answer
> > > comes when I answer your other questions:
> > >
> > > > by what standard would they define 'best'?
> > > > Why would it be good if people thought 'longer
> or
> > > > faster'? What is 'wisdom'? It would seem
> that an
> > > > objective morality is still implied.
> > >
> > > Doesn't "best" just end up being, in the long
> run,
> > > whatever maximizes
> > > your potential to survive and reproduce? The
> > > Samurai think best is
> > > being better with the sword. We think best is
> > > thinking faster. It all
> > > depends on where you live.
> > >
> > > Mike W.
> > >
> > 'best' might possibly be related to whatever
> maximizes
> > your potential to survive, but even if this was
> so:
> > the fact that the laws of physics are the same
> > everywhere mean that there would still be some
> > objective standards for deciding what maximized
> > 'potential to survive', no matter where you lived.
>
> I don't think we disagree on the laws of physics.
> What part
> of the laws of physics are you calling objective
> morality?
>
> Mike W.
>
A good question. I do have a theory. Currently I
like a proposal hinted at by David Deutsch in his book
'The Fabric of Reality'. The idea is that objective
morality is defined by a sophisticated computational
property extending across all the Everett branches of
the quantum multiverse (this requires the Many World's
Interpretation of quantum mechanics). I might write
an essay on the idea at some point. But basically my
theory implies the following:
(1) Many World's Interpretation of QM
(2) Panpsychism (Some degree of sentience in
everything)
(3) Total altruism impossible in a general
intelligence
(4) General intelligence without sentience impossible
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