Thanks for this reply, meu caro. My remarks: 1. Though “bliss” and (tranquil) “nirvana” are vague, and some people might equate them, in the text being discussed they are made a bit more precisified… But I guess we both agree that it is still far away from making them precise terms—especially because we are not very good at measuring welfare. I consider this as evidence that uncertainty plays a role in our “repugnant” intuitions.
2. Allow me to be brief and tentative: I don’t consider my remarks as evidence against the total view. I suspect the total view is the right theory of value / good (though I distinguish this from a theory of justice / duty—which is another way of answering “what should we do?”). I think that RC reasoning is probably correct—but it is hard to apply in uncertain comparison, or might be quite trivial (and so not very “repugnant”) in certain ones.
3. I agree that RC reasoning does not involve uncertainty / risk / probabilities. But I find the premises and its steps quite reminiscent of some “low probability—high expectancy” cases—so that I suspect the formal arguments are related (besides the fact that both conclusions seem to be entailed by expected utility theory). When I do have the time to engage with the literature, I’ll start with Nebel’s Intrapersonal Addition Paradox, and Kosonen’s solution.
Thanks for this reply, meu caro. My remarks:
1. Though “bliss” and (tranquil) “nirvana” are vague, and some people might equate them, in the text being discussed they are made a bit more precisified… But I guess we both agree that it is still far away from making them precise terms—especially because we are not very good at measuring welfare. I consider this as evidence that uncertainty plays a role in our “repugnant” intuitions.
2. Allow me to be brief and tentative: I don’t consider my remarks as evidence against the total view. I suspect the total view is the right theory of value / good (though I distinguish this from a theory of justice / duty—which is another way of answering “what should we do?”). I think that RC reasoning is probably correct—but it is hard to apply in uncertain comparison, or might be quite trivial (and so not very “repugnant”) in certain ones.
3. I agree that RC reasoning does not involve uncertainty / risk / probabilities. But I find the premises and its steps quite reminiscent of some “low probability—high expectancy” cases—so that I suspect the formal arguments are related (besides the fact that both conclusions seem to be entailed by expected utility theory). When I do have the time to engage with the literature, I’ll start with Nebel’s Intrapersonal Addition Paradox, and Kosonen’s solution.
Thanks for clarifying!