Whether I personally feel pain is an empirical question, so it stands to reason that it’s an empirical question for other beings as well. (Presumably when you feel pain it’s a matter of fact that you do, not a matter of opinion.) Therefore it’s an empirical question whether a paperclipper feels pain, although I don’t know how we’d find the answer to this question even in principle. You could say that you don’t value the paperclipper’s pain even if it does feel pain, but that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Pain is bad no matter who has it.
Perhaps a paperclipper feels pain in a way that’s dramatically different from how I feel it. Then the question is more like, does the paperclipper have an experience that it strongly dislikes? (This question is only meaningful if the paperclipper is sentient, which it may very well not be.)
It’s an empirical question whether, say, certain neurons fire. What it means to feel pain in the “hard problem” way is kind of squishy.
I just don’t find it plausible that we can empirically solve this, anymore than I find it plausible that we can empirically prove moral realism or dualism.
Whether I personally feel pain is an empirical question, so it stands to reason that it’s an empirical question for other beings as well. (Presumably when you feel pain it’s a matter of fact that you do, not a matter of opinion.) Therefore it’s an empirical question whether a paperclipper feels pain, although I don’t know how we’d find the answer to this question even in principle. You could say that you don’t value the paperclipper’s pain even if it does feel pain, but that doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. Pain is bad no matter who has it.
Perhaps a paperclipper feels pain in a way that’s dramatically different from how I feel it. Then the question is more like, does the paperclipper have an experience that it strongly dislikes? (This question is only meaningful if the paperclipper is sentient, which it may very well not be.)
It’s an empirical question whether, say, certain neurons fire. What it means to feel pain in the “hard problem” way is kind of squishy.
I just don’t find it plausible that we can empirically solve this, anymore than I find it plausible that we can empirically prove moral realism or dualism.