Clara said she would appreciate âAny negative utilitarian or person knowledgeable about negative utilitarianism commenting on why NU doesnât necessarily recommend extinction.â
Simon Knutssonâs paper âThe World Destruction Argumentâ has an argument that Iâd simplify as âThe World Destruction Problem is a problem of consequentialism, not of NUâ. One of the arguments (simplifying) being that classic utilitarians would recommend the extinction of all sentient life if they found out that it was resiliently net negative, or that it could be replaced by marginally happier sentient life through killing off every current sentient being painlessly.
For other thoughts on why Negative Utilitarianism doesnât recommend extinction, see this excerpt from a Center For Reducing Suffering article.
Saying for âother thoughts on why NU doesnât recommend extinctionâ is a bit of a misnomer here. The Knutsson argument youâve just state doesnât even try to show NU doesnât recommend extinction, it just makes a case that it is part of a wider class of more popular theories that also sometimes do this.
An obvious response to Knutsson is that it also matters in what circumstances a theory recommends extinction, and that NU probably recommends extinction in a wider variety of circumstances where other forms of consequentialism donât, including ones where it is especially counterintuitive, i.e. utopian situations where the possible future risk of extreme suffering is not literally zero* but very low and every sentient being is aware of this but wants their lives to continue anyway. Also, versions of NU that give some positive weight to happiness even though it canât be outweighed by extreme suffering actually share with classical utilitarians the results that we should kill everyone painlessly when they could be replaced with happier beings, so itâs not really a case of both views have counterintuitive implications, about killing everyone, but just in different cases. (Though I guess there are cases where CU would recommend killing everyone but NU does not.)
*Iâm assuming that if extreme suffering canât be outweighed neither can any non-zero chance of extreme suffering. Maybe thatâs not true on all versions of NU? But Iâm guess dropping this will bring other trouble.
Thank you so much for pushing back on my simplistic comment! I agree that my framing was misleading (I commented without even re-reading had said). Thanks for highlighting crucial considerations on counterintuitive conclusions in NU and CU.
Your comment makes me realize that an objection based on utopian situations makes sense (and Iâve found it reasonable in the past as a crux against NU). I guess my frustration with the use of the World Destruction Argument against NU, in the ways EAs often bring it up, is that it criticizes the fact that NU recommends extinction in our world (which contains suffering), even though CU has a decent chance of recommending extinction in our world (as soon as we determine whether wild invertebrates are living net-negative lives or not!).[1]
Though again, if there are higher chances of astronomically good than astronomically bad futures, animal suffering is easily outweighed in CU, but not in NU (but CUs could change their mind on the empirical aspect and recommend extinction). But my impression is that this isnât what people (among non-philosophers, which includes me) are objecting to? They mostly seem to find deliberate extinction repugnant (which is something I think many views can agree upon).
Yeah, I agree that in some sense saying âwe should instantly reject a theory that recommends WDâ doesnât not combine super-well with belief in classical U, for the reasons you give. Thatâs compatible with classical Uâs problems with WD being less bad than NUâs problemâs with it, is all Iâm saying.
Clara said she would appreciate âAny negative utilitarian or person knowledgeable about negative utilitarianism commenting on why NU doesnât necessarily recommend extinction.â
Simon Knutssonâs paper âThe World Destruction Argumentâ has an argument that Iâd simplify as âThe World Destruction Problem is a problem of consequentialism, not of NUâ. One of the arguments (simplifying) being that classic utilitarians would recommend the extinction of all sentient life if they found out that it was resiliently net negative, or that it could be replaced by marginally happier sentient life through killing off every current sentient being painlessly.
For other thoughts on why Negative Utilitarianism doesnât recommend extinction, see this excerpt from a Center For Reducing Suffering article.
Saying for âother thoughts on why NU doesnât recommend extinctionâ is a bit of a misnomer here. The Knutsson argument youâve just state doesnât even try to show NU doesnât recommend extinction, it just makes a case that it is part of a wider class of more popular theories that also sometimes do this.
An obvious response to Knutsson is that it also matters in what circumstances a theory recommends extinction, and that NU probably recommends extinction in a wider variety of circumstances where other forms of consequentialism donât, including ones where it is especially counterintuitive, i.e. utopian situations where the possible future risk of extreme suffering is not literally zero* but very low and every sentient being is aware of this but wants their lives to continue anyway. Also, versions of NU that give some positive weight to happiness even though it canât be outweighed by extreme suffering actually share with classical utilitarians the results that we should kill everyone painlessly when they could be replaced with happier beings, so itâs not really a case of both views have counterintuitive implications, about killing everyone, but just in different cases. (Though I guess there are cases where CU would recommend killing everyone but NU does not.)
*Iâm assuming that if extreme suffering canât be outweighed neither can any non-zero chance of extreme suffering. Maybe thatâs not true on all versions of NU? But Iâm guess dropping this will bring other trouble.
Thank you so much for pushing back on my simplistic comment! I agree that my framing was misleading (I commented without even re-reading had said). Thanks for highlighting crucial considerations on counterintuitive conclusions in NU and CU.
Your comment makes me realize that an objection based on utopian situations makes sense (and Iâve found it reasonable in the past as a crux against NU). I guess my frustration with the use of the World Destruction Argument against NU, in the ways EAs often bring it up, is that it criticizes the fact that NU recommends extinction in our world (which contains suffering), even though CU has a decent chance of recommending extinction in our world (as soon as we determine whether wild invertebrates are living net-negative lives or not!).[1]
Though again, if there are higher chances of astronomically good than astronomically bad futures, animal suffering is easily outweighed in CU, but not in NU (but CUs could change their mind on the empirical aspect and recommend extinction). But my impression is that this isnât what people (among non-philosophers, which includes me) are objecting to? They mostly seem to find deliberate extinction repugnant (which is something I think many views can agree upon).
Yeah, I agree that in some sense saying âwe should instantly reject a theory that recommends WDâ doesnât not combine super-well with belief in classical U, for the reasons you give. Thatâs compatible with classical Uâs problems with WD being less bad than NUâs problemâs with it, is all Iâm saying.