Thanks for the thoughts, Michael. Sorry for the minor thread necro—Milan just linked me to this comment from my short post on short-termism.
The first point feels like a crux here.
On the second, the obvious counterargument is that it applies just as well to e.g. murder; in the case where the person is killed, “there is no sensible comparison to be made” between their status and that in the case where they are alive.
You could still be against killing for other reasons, like effects on friends of the victim, but I think most people have an intuition that the effects of murder on the victim alone are a significant argument against it. For example, it seems strange to say it’s fine to kill someone when you’re on a deserted island with no hope of rescue, no resource constraints, and when you expect the murder to have no side effects on you.
I guess the counter-counterargument is something like “while they were alive, if they knew they were going to die, they would not approve.” But that seems like a fallback to the first point, rather than an affirmation of the second.
A relevant thought experiment: upon killing the other islander, the murderer is miraculously given the chance to resurrect them. This option is only available after the victim is dead; should it matter what their preferences were in life? (I think some people would bite this bullet, which also implies that generally living in accordance with our ancestors’ aggregate wishes is good.)
On the second, the obvious counterargument is that it applies just as well to e.g. murder; in the case where the person is killed, “there is no sensible comparison to be made” between their status and that in the case where they are alive
Person-affecting views are those will hold not all possible people matter. Once you’ve decided who matters (the present, necessary or actual people), it’s then a different question how you think about the badness of death for those that matter. You can say creating people isn’t good/bad, but it’s still bad if already existing people die early. FWIW, I also find Epicureanism about the badness of death rather plausible, i.e. I don’t think we compare the value of living longer for someone. I recognise this makes me something of a ‘moral hipster’ but I think the arguments for it are pretty good, although I won’t get into that here. As such, I think death, whether by murder or other means, isn’t bad for someone. I think we tend to have the intuition that murder is wrong over and above what it deprives the deceased from, which it why we think it’s just as wrong to murder someone with 1 month vs 10 years left to live. hence I think you’re getting at a deontological intuition, not one about value.
I find the stuff about posthumous harms and benefits very implausible. If Socrates wants us to say ‘Socrates’ and we do, does it really make his life go better?
Thanks for the thoughts, Michael. Sorry for the minor thread necro—Milan just linked me to this comment from my short post on short-termism.
The first point feels like a crux here.
On the second, the obvious counterargument is that it applies just as well to e.g. murder; in the case where the person is killed, “there is no sensible comparison to be made” between their status and that in the case where they are alive.
You could still be against killing for other reasons, like effects on friends of the victim, but I think most people have an intuition that the effects of murder on the victim alone are a significant argument against it. For example, it seems strange to say it’s fine to kill someone when you’re on a deserted island with no hope of rescue, no resource constraints, and when you expect the murder to have no side effects on you.
I guess the counter-counterargument is something like “while they were alive, if they knew they were going to die, they would not approve.” But that seems like a fallback to the first point, rather than an affirmation of the second.
A relevant thought experiment: upon killing the other islander, the murderer is miraculously given the chance to resurrect them. This option is only available after the victim is dead; should it matter what their preferences were in life? (I think some people would bite this bullet, which also implies that generally living in accordance with our ancestors’ aggregate wishes is good.)
Person-affecting views are those will hold not all possible people matter. Once you’ve decided who matters (the present, necessary or actual people), it’s then a different question how you think about the badness of death for those that matter. You can say creating people isn’t good/bad, but it’s still bad if already existing people die early. FWIW, I also find Epicureanism about the badness of death rather plausible, i.e. I don’t think we compare the value of living longer for someone. I recognise this makes me something of a ‘moral hipster’ but I think the arguments for it are pretty good, although I won’t get into that here. As such, I think death, whether by murder or other means, isn’t bad for someone. I think we tend to have the intuition that murder is wrong over and above what it deprives the deceased from, which it why we think it’s just as wrong to murder someone with 1 month vs 10 years left to live. hence I think you’re getting at a deontological intuition, not one about value.
I find the stuff about posthumous harms and benefits very implausible. If Socrates wants us to say ‘Socrates’ and we do, does it really make his life go better?