So, given our methodological commitment to letting the empirical evidence drive the results, we decided not to include this hypothesis in our calculations
I’m not sure I understand this reasoning. If our interpretation of the empirical evidence depends on whether we accept different philosophical hypotheses, it seems like the results should reflect our uncertainty over those hypotheses. What would it mean for claims about weights on potential conscious experiences to be driven purely by empirical evidence, if questions about consciousness are inherently philosophical?
The thought is that we think of the Conscious Subsystems hypothesis as a bit like panpsychism: not something you can rule out, but a sufficiently speculative thesis that we aren’t interested in including it, as we don’t think anyone really believes it for empirical reasons. Insofar as they assign some credence to it, it’s probably for philosophical reasons.
Anyway, totally understand wanting every hypothesis over which you’re uncertain to be reflected in your welfare range estimates. That’s a good project, but it wasn’t ours. But fwiw, it’s really unclear what that’s going to imply in this particular case, as it’s so hard to pin down which Conscious Subsystems hypothesis you have in mind and the credences you should assign to all the variants.
I’m not sure I understand this reasoning. If our interpretation of the empirical evidence depends on whether we accept different philosophical hypotheses, it seems like the results should reflect our uncertainty over those hypotheses. What would it mean for claims about weights on potential conscious experiences to be driven purely by empirical evidence, if questions about consciousness are inherently philosophical?
The thought is that we think of the Conscious Subsystems hypothesis as a bit like panpsychism: not something you can rule out, but a sufficiently speculative thesis that we aren’t interested in including it, as we don’t think anyone really believes it for empirical reasons. Insofar as they assign some credence to it, it’s probably for philosophical reasons.
Anyway, totally understand wanting every hypothesis over which you’re uncertain to be reflected in your welfare range estimates. That’s a good project, but it wasn’t ours. But fwiw, it’s really unclear what that’s going to imply in this particular case, as it’s so hard to pin down which Conscious Subsystems hypothesis you have in mind and the credences you should assign to all the variants.