Thanks for this question, Richard. You’re right that I don’t focus on positive affective states in the post, though I think most of the arguments would port over. In any case, since the MWP assumes hedonism, the result that chickens and wireheaded humans can realize the same amount of welfare is still pretty significant. Indeed, even the weaker S-Equality Result is significant if your asymmetry hypothesis is correct, as S-Equality would get you most of the way toward (plain old) Equality.
Separately, and as you might guess, I’m skeptical of the view that humans who are maxed out hedonically are still realizing orders of magnitude less welfare than humans who are flourishing by more conventional standards. I think the intuitions that support that view boil down to humans preferring the human way of life—a preference that doesn’t strike me as having much evidential value. But I suppose that’s a conversation for another time!
Thanks for this question, Richard. You’re right that I don’t focus on positive affective states in the post, though I think most of the arguments would port over. In any case, since the MWP assumes hedonism, the result that chickens and wireheaded humans can realize the same amount of welfare is still pretty significant. Indeed, even the weaker S-Equality Result is significant if your asymmetry hypothesis is correct, as S-Equality would get you most of the way toward (plain old) Equality.
Separately, and as you might guess, I’m skeptical of the view that humans who are maxed out hedonically are still realizing orders of magnitude less welfare than humans who are flourishing by more conventional standards. I think the intuitions that support that view boil down to humans preferring the human way of life—a preference that doesn’t strike me as having much evidential value. But I suppose that’s a conversation for another time!