Some people may worry that minimalist axiologies would imply an affirmative answer to the following questions:
Would an empty world (i.e. a world without sentient beings) be axiologically perfect?
For any hypothetical world, would the best outcome always be realized by pressing a button that leads to its instant cessation?
The author agrees that the answers to these questions are “yes” (EDIT: for the specific class of minimalist axiologies considered in this post). The author’s main point (EDIT: in Section 2, which addresses these questions, there’s also a third question and a Section 3 that talks about it) is that perhaps you shouldn’t be worried about that.
The author agrees that the answers to these questions are “yes”.
Not quite. The author assumes a certain class of minimalist axiologies (experientialist ones), according to which the answers to those questions are:
Yes (though a world with untroubled sentient beings would be equally perfect, and there are good reasons to focus more on that ideal of minimalism in practice).
If the hypothetical world contains no disvalue, then pressing the button is not strictly better, but if the hypothetical world does contain disvalue, then it would be better to press a cessation button (which in consequentialist terms is equivalent to the non-creation of that world).
The author does not agree that the answer to question 2 is “yes” for minimalist views in general, since other minimalist views may hold that the answer is “no” (as he clarifies in the first footnote).
The author’s main point is that perhaps you shouldn’t be worried about that.
I don’t think that’s a fair summary. Better summaries of the main points of the piece would be that:
Cessation implications are not unique to experientialist minimalist views, and other consequentialist views arguably have worse implications, including worse cessation implications (even if we do find the theoretical implications of experientialist minimalism counterintuitive or unsettling).
These hypothetical implications in abstract thought experiments must be clearly distinguished from the practical question regarding how we should act in the real world. On this second issue, the author argues that minimalists have strong reasons not to seek to create an empty world, and to instead pursue a cooperative and nonviolent approach.
The worries I respond to are complex and the essay has many main points. Like any author, I hope that people would consider the points in their proper context (and not take them out of context). One main point is the contextualization of the worries itself, which is highlighted by the overviews (1.1–1.2) focusing a lot on the relevant assumptions and on minding the gap between theory and practice.
To complex questions, I don’t think it’s useful to reduce answers to either “yes” or “no”, especially when the answers rest on unrealistic assumptions and look very different in theory versus practice. Between theory and practice, I also tend to consider the practical implications more important.
I don’t think these are complex questions! If your minimalist axiology ranks based on states of the world (and not actions except inasmuch as they lead to states of the world), then the best possible value to achieve is zero. Assuming this is achieved by an empty universe, then there is nothing strictly better than taking an action that creates an empty universe forever! This is a really easy to prove theorem!
I believe that it’s a complex question whether or not this should be a dealbreaker for adopting a minimalist axiology, but that’s not the question you wrote down. The answers to
Would an empty world (i.e. a world without sentient beings) be axiologically perfect?
For any hypothetical world, would the best outcome always be realized by pressing a button that leads to its instant cessation?
really are just straightforwardly “yes”, for state-based minimalist axiologies where an empty universe has none of the thing you want to minimize, which is the thing you are analyzing in this post unless I have totally misread it.
Hi Rohin; I apologize for being vague and implicit; I agree that the first question is not complex, and I should’ve clarified that I’m primarily responding to the related (but in the post, almost completely implicit) worries which I think are much more complex than the literal questions are. You helped me realize just now that the post may look like it’s primarily answering the written-down questions, even though the main reason for all my elaboration (on the assumptions, possible biases, comparison with offsetting views, etc.) was to respond to the implicit worries.
Regarding whether the answers to the first two questions are straightforwardly “yes”, I would still note that such a one-word answer would lack the nuance that is present in what Magnus wrote above (and which I noted already in the overview because I think it’s relevant for the worries).
I ignored the first footnote because it’s not in the posts’ remit, according to the post itself:
Additionally, the scope is limited to minimalist axiologies that are based on experientialist accounts of welfare (cf. van der Deijl, 2021). In other words, I assume that the welfare of any given being cannot be affected by things that do not enter their experience, and thus set aside views such as preference-based axiologies that imply extra-experientialism.
If you assume this limited scope, I think the answer to the second question is “yes” (and that the post agrees with this). I agree that things change if you expand the scope to other minimalist axiologies. It’s unfortunate that the quote I selected implies “all minimalist axiologies” but I really was trying to talk about this post.
I shouldn’t have called it “the main point”, I should have said something like “the main point made in response to the two questions I mentioned”, which is what I actually meant.
I agree that there is more detail about why the author thinks you shouldn’t be worried about it that I did not summarize. I still think it is accurate to say that the author’s main response to question 1 and 2, as written in Section 2, is “the answers are yes, but actually that’s fine and you shouldn’t be worried about it”, with the point about cessation implications being one argument for that view.
Your comment above makes all sense regarding the literal questions (even if not the implicit worries that I intended to respond to); thanks for elaborating. :)
Still, I would not reduce my (theoretical) response to the implicit worries all the way down to “yes, but actually that’s fine and you shouldn’t be worried about it”. The “yes” is buried in the middle in 2.3 because it’s not the end of the theoretical response. After that, the following sections 2.4–2.6 still address a lot of points that may be relevant for our potential intuitions (such as worries) about endorsing cessation even in theory.
For example, I certainly feel worried myself about endorsing cessation of the ‘near-perfect paradise’ (even in theory), but I don’t tell myself that I “shouldn’t be worried about it”. Instead, I note (as I do in 2.4) that it seems perfectly fine to both endorse experientialist minimalist consequentialism in theory and to simultaneously deeply account for all the practical reasons that we have to side less with the relatively unpopular ideal of emptiness and more with the equal* and more popular ideal of untroubled lives.
(* equal for minimalists.)
Regarding worried intuitions, I of course also encourage people to compare whether they feel more worried about the (theoretical) minimalist cessation implications than about the (likewise theoretical) implications of offsetting views presented in 2.5. The latter strike me and many others as far more worrisome, so I’d prefer to also highlight that contrast as far as the worries (and not only the literal questions) are concerned.
In any case, I really appreciate that you read my post even if we might have different intuitions about these thought experiments. :)
It’s unfortunate that the quote I selected implies “all minimalist axiologies” but I really was trying to talk about this post.
Perhaps it would be good to add an edit on that as well? E.g. “The author agrees that the answers to these questions are ‘yes’ (for the restricted class of minimalist axiologies he explores here).” :)
(The restriction is relevant, not least since a number of EAs do seem to holdnon-experientialist minimalist views.)
For others who were confused, like I was:
The author agrees that the answers to these questions are “yes” (EDIT: for the specific class of minimalist axiologies considered in this post). The author’s main point (EDIT: in Section 2, which addresses these questions, there’s also a third question and a Section 3 that talks about it) is that perhaps you shouldn’t be worried about that.
Not quite. The author assumes a certain class of minimalist axiologies (experientialist ones), according to which the answers to those questions are:
Yes (though a world with untroubled sentient beings would be equally perfect, and there are good reasons to focus more on that ideal of minimalism in practice).
If the hypothetical world contains no disvalue, then pressing the button is not strictly better, but if the hypothetical world does contain disvalue, then it would be better to press a cessation button (which in consequentialist terms is equivalent to the non-creation of that world).
The author does not agree that the answer to question 2 is “yes” for minimalist views in general, since other minimalist views may hold that the answer is “no” (as he clarifies in the first footnote).
I don’t think that’s a fair summary. Better summaries of the main points of the piece would be that:
Cessation implications are not unique to experientialist minimalist views, and other consequentialist views arguably have worse implications, including worse cessation implications (even if we do find the theoretical implications of experientialist minimalism counterintuitive or unsettling).
These hypothetical implications in abstract thought experiments must be clearly distinguished from the practical question regarding how we should act in the real world. On this second issue, the author argues that minimalists have strong reasons not to seek to create an empty world, and to instead pursue a cooperative and nonviolent approach.
Thanks for summarizing it.
The worries I respond to are complex and the essay has many main points. Like any author, I hope that people would consider the points in their proper context (and not take them out of context). One main point is the contextualization of the worries itself, which is highlighted by the overviews (1.1–1.2) focusing a lot on the relevant assumptions and on minding the gap between theory and practice.
To complex questions, I don’t think it’s useful to reduce answers to either “yes” or “no”, especially when the answers rest on unrealistic assumptions and look very different in theory versus practice. Between theory and practice, I also tend to consider the practical implications more important.
I don’t think these are complex questions! If your minimalist axiology ranks based on states of the world (and not actions except inasmuch as they lead to states of the world), then the best possible value to achieve is zero. Assuming this is achieved by an empty universe, then there is nothing strictly better than taking an action that creates an empty universe forever! This is a really easy to prove theorem!
I believe that it’s a complex question whether or not this should be a dealbreaker for adopting a minimalist axiology, but that’s not the question you wrote down. The answers to
really are just straightforwardly “yes”, for state-based minimalist axiologies where an empty universe has none of the thing you want to minimize, which is the thing you are analyzing in this post unless I have totally misread it.
Hi Rohin; I apologize for being vague and implicit; I agree that the first question is not complex, and I should’ve clarified that I’m primarily responding to the related (but in the post, almost completely implicit) worries which I think are much more complex than the literal questions are. You helped me realize just now that the post may look like it’s primarily answering the written-down questions, even though the main reason for all my elaboration (on the assumptions, possible biases, comparison with offsetting views, etc.) was to respond to the implicit worries.
Regarding whether the answers to the first two questions are straightforwardly “yes”, I would still note that such a one-word answer would lack the nuance that is present in what Magnus wrote above (and which I noted already in the overview because I think it’s relevant for the worries).
(I’ll continue a bit under your other comment.)
I ignored the first footnote because it’s not in the posts’ remit, according to the post itself:
If you assume this limited scope, I think the answer to the second question is “yes” (and that the post agrees with this). I agree that things change if you expand the scope to other minimalist axiologies. It’s unfortunate that the quote I selected implies “all minimalist axiologies” but I really was trying to talk about this post.
I shouldn’t have called it “the main point”, I should have said something like “the main point made in response to the two questions I mentioned”, which is what I actually meant.
I agree that there is more detail about why the author thinks you shouldn’t be worried about it that I did not summarize. I still think it is accurate to say that the author’s main response to question 1 and 2, as written in Section 2, is “the answers are yes, but actually that’s fine and you shouldn’t be worried about it”, with the point about cessation implications being one argument for that view.
(Continued)
Your comment above makes all sense regarding the literal questions (even if not the implicit worries that I intended to respond to); thanks for elaborating. :)
Still, I would not reduce my (theoretical) response to the implicit worries all the way down to “yes, but actually that’s fine and you shouldn’t be worried about it”. The “yes” is buried in the middle in 2.3 because it’s not the end of the theoretical response. After that, the following sections 2.4–2.6 still address a lot of points that may be relevant for our potential intuitions (such as worries) about endorsing cessation even in theory.
For example, I certainly feel worried myself about endorsing cessation of the ‘near-perfect paradise’ (even in theory), but I don’t tell myself that I “shouldn’t be worried about it”. Instead, I note (as I do in 2.4) that it seems perfectly fine to both endorse experientialist minimalist consequentialism in theory and to simultaneously deeply account for all the practical reasons that we have to side less with the relatively unpopular ideal of emptiness and more with the equal* and more popular ideal of untroubled lives.
(* equal for minimalists.)
Regarding worried intuitions, I of course also encourage people to compare whether they feel more worried about the (theoretical) minimalist cessation implications than about the (likewise theoretical) implications of offsetting views presented in 2.5. The latter strike me and many others as far more worrisome, so I’d prefer to also highlight that contrast as far as the worries (and not only the literal questions) are concerned.
In any case, I really appreciate that you read my post even if we might have different intuitions about these thought experiments. :)
Perhaps it would be good to add an edit on that as well? E.g. “The author agrees that the answers to these questions are ‘yes’ (for the restricted class of minimalist axiologies he explores here).” :)
(The restriction is relevant, not least since a number of EAs do seem to hold non-experientialist minimalist views.)
Sure, done.