The contractarian (and commonsense and pluralism, but the theory I would most invoke for theoretical understanding is contractarian) objection to such things greatly outweighs the utilitarian case.
It is worth noting that this is not, as it stands, a reply available to a pure traditional utilitarian.
failing to leave one galaxy, let alone one solar system for existing beings out of billions of galaxies would be ludicrously monomaniacal and overconfident
But a relevant question here is whether that also holds true given a purely utilitarian view, as opposed to, say, from a perspective that relies on various theories in some notional moral parliament.
It is, of course, perfectly fine to respond to the question “how do most utilitarians feel about X?” by saying “I’m not a utilitarian, but I am sympathetic to it, and here is how someone sympathetic to utilitarianism can reply by relying on other moral frameworks”. But then it’s worth being clear that the reply is not a defense of pure traditional utilitarianism — quite the contrary.
I think I, and maybe others, are still confused about the point of your top-level comment. Simon Knutsson’s argument is against utilitarianism, and I think Richard Ngo wanted to see if there was a good counter-argument against it from a utilitarian perspective, or if a utilitarian just has to “bite the bullet”. It seems like the motivation for both people were to try to figure out whether utilitarianism is the right moral philosophy / correct normative ethics.
Your reply doesn’t seem to address their motivation, which is why I’m confused. (If utilitarianism is the right moral philosophy then it would give the right action guidance even if one was 100% sure of it and other considerations such as contractarianism didn’t apply, so it seems beside the point to talk about contractarianism and overconfidence.) Is the point that utilitarianism probably isn’t right, but some other form of consequentialism is? If so, what do you have in mind?
That’s why the very first words of my comment were “I don’t identify as a utilitarian.”
I appreciate that, and as I noted, I think this is fine. :-)
I just wanted to flag this because it took me some time to clarify whether you were replying based on 1) moral uncertainty/other frameworks, or 2) instrumental considerations relative to pure utilitarianism. I first assumed you were replying based on 2) (as Brian suggested), and I believe many others reading your answer might draw the same conclusion. But a closer reading made it clear to me you were primarily replying based on 1).
I think the idea is that even a pure utilitarian should care about contractarian-style thinking for almost any practical scenario, even if there are some thought experiments where that’s not the case.
I think that is basically true in practice, but I am also saying that even absent those pragmatic considerations constraining utilitarianism, I still would hold these other non-utilitarian normative views and reject things like not leaving some space for existing beings for a tiny proportional increase in resources for utility monsters.
It is worth noting that this is not, as it stands, a reply available to a pure traditional utilitarian.
But a relevant question here is whether that also holds true given a purely utilitarian view, as opposed to, say, from a perspective that relies on various theories in some notional moral parliament.
It is, of course, perfectly fine to respond to the question “how do most utilitarians feel about X?” by saying “I’m not a utilitarian, but I am sympathetic to it, and here is how someone sympathetic to utilitarianism can reply by relying on other moral frameworks”. But then it’s worth being clear that the reply is not a defense of pure traditional utilitarianism — quite the contrary.
That’s why the very first words of my comment were “I don’t identify as a utilitarian.”
I think I, and maybe others, are still confused about the point of your top-level comment. Simon Knutsson’s argument is against utilitarianism, and I think Richard Ngo wanted to see if there was a good counter-argument against it from a utilitarian perspective, or if a utilitarian just has to “bite the bullet”. It seems like the motivation for both people were to try to figure out whether utilitarianism is the right moral philosophy / correct normative ethics.
Your reply doesn’t seem to address their motivation, which is why I’m confused. (If utilitarianism is the right moral philosophy then it would give the right action guidance even if one was 100% sure of it and other considerations such as contractarianism didn’t apply, so it seems beside the point to talk about contractarianism and overconfidence.) Is the point that utilitarianism probably isn’t right, but some other form of consequentialism is? If so, what do you have in mind?
I appreciate that, and as I noted, I think this is fine. :-)
I just wanted to flag this because it took me some time to clarify whether you were replying based on 1) moral uncertainty/other frameworks, or 2) instrumental considerations relative to pure utilitarianism. I first assumed you were replying based on 2) (as Brian suggested), and I believe many others reading your answer might draw the same conclusion. But a closer reading made it clear to me you were primarily replying based on 1).
I think the idea is that even a pure utilitarian should care about contractarian-style thinking for almost any practical scenario, even if there are some thought experiments where that’s not the case.
I think that is basically true in practice, but I am also saying that even absent those pragmatic considerations constraining utilitarianism, I still would hold these other non-utilitarian normative views and reject things like not leaving some space for existing beings for a tiny proportional increase in resources for utility monsters.