Linch—This is a fascinating issue, whether evolutionary debunking could affect utilitarian arguments as well as deontological arguments.
Once possible way this could work is that we could develop an evo-debunking account of why utilitarians value sentient experience over everything else. From our evolved brains’ point of view, of course sentience seems like the whole point of the cosmos. But I could imagine an alternative ethics that values other kinds of phenomena, such as the complexity and functionality of all organic adaptations. I guess my earlier essay about ‘body values’ alludes to this—our bodies may have moral interests that our sentience is not conscious of.
Also, an evo-debunking of sentience-centric utilitarianism might value forms of computation, information processing, and intelligence that might not be ‘conscious’ in the human sense, but that might still be considered valuable from some perspectives.
Traditionalists and conservatives could also use an evo-debunking of individualistic sentience-centric utilitarianism to argue that certain cultural or aesthetic traditions, legacies, or achievements also have some kind of intrinsic moral value.
Linch—This is a fascinating issue, whether evolutionary debunking could affect utilitarian arguments as well as deontological arguments.
Once possible way this could work is that we could develop an evo-debunking account of why utilitarians value sentient experience over everything else. From our evolved brains’ point of view, of course sentience seems like the whole point of the cosmos. But I could imagine an alternative ethics that values other kinds of phenomena, such as the complexity and functionality of all organic adaptations. I guess my earlier essay about ‘body values’ alludes to this—our bodies may have moral interests that our sentience is not conscious of.
Also, an evo-debunking of sentience-centric utilitarianism might value forms of computation, information processing, and intelligence that might not be ‘conscious’ in the human sense, but that might still be considered valuable from some perspectives.
Traditionalists and conservatives could also use an evo-debunking of individualistic sentience-centric utilitarianism to argue that certain cultural or aesthetic traditions, legacies, or achievements also have some kind of intrinsic moral value.