Also, you suggest that this result lends support to common EA beliefs.
Hmm, I wasnât trying to suggest that, but I might have accidentally implied something. I would be curious what you are pointing to?
First, it leads to preference utilitarianism, not hedonic utilitarianism
I used preferences about restaurants as an example because that seemed like something people can relate to easily, but thatâs just an example. The theorem is compatible with hedonic utilitarianism. (In that case, the theorem would just prove that the groupâs utility function is the sum of each individualâs happiness.)
Second, EAs tend to value animals and future people, but they would arguably not count as part of the âgroupâ in this framework(?).
I donât think that this theorem says much about who you aggregate. Itâs just simply stating that if you aggregate some group of persons in a certain way, then that aggregation must take the form of addition.
Third, Iâm not sure what this tells you about the creation or non-creation of possible beings (cf. the asymmetry in population ethics).
In that case, it would IMO be better to change âtotal utilitarianismâ to âutilitarianismâ in the article. Utilitarianism is different from other forms of consequentialism in that it uses thoroughgoing aggregation. Isnât that what Harsanyiâs theorem mainly shows? It doesnât really add any intuitions about population ethics. Mentioning the repugnant conclusion in this context feels premature.
In that case, it would IMO be better to change âtotal utilitarianismâ to âutilitarianismâ in the article. Utilitarianism is different from other forms of consequentialism in that it uses thoroughgoing aggregation. Isnât that what Harsanyiâs theorem mainly shows?
Hmm, it does show that itâs a linear addition of utilities (as opposed to, say, the sum of their logarithms). So I think itâs stronger than saying just âthoroughgoing aggregationâ.
Iâm not very familiar with the terminology here, but I remember that in this paper, Alastair Norcross used the term âthoroughgoing aggregationâ for what seems to be linear addition of utilities in particular. Thatâs what I had in mind anyway, so Iâm not sure I believe anything different form you. The reason I commented above was because I donât understand the choice of âtotal utilitarianismâ instead of just âutilitarianism.â Doesnât every form of utilitarianism use linear addition of utilities in a case where population size remains fixed? But only total utilitarianism implies the repugnant conclusion. Your conclusion section IMO suggests that Harsanyiâs theorem (which takes a case where population size is indeed fixed) does something to help motivate total utilitarianism over other forms of utilitarianism, such as prior-existence utilitarianism, negative utilitarianism or average utilitarianism. You already acknowledged in your reply further above to that it doesnât do much of that. Thatâs why I suggested rephrasing your conclusion section. Alternatively, you could also explain in what ways you might think the utilitarian alternatives to total utilitarianism are contrived somehow or not in line with Harsanyiâs assumptions. And probably Iâm missing something about how you think about all of this, because the rest of the article seemed really excellent and clear to me. I just find the conclusion section really jarring.
Alastair Norcross used the term âthoroughgoing aggregationâ for what seems to be linear addition of utilities in particular
Ah, my mistake â I had heard this definition before, which seems slightly different.
I just find the conclusion section really jarring.
Thanks for the suggestion â always tricky to figure out what a âstraightforwardâ consequence is in philosophy.
I changed it to this â curious if you still find it jarring?
Total utilitarianism is a fairly controversial position. The above example where (1,1)=(2,0) can be extended to show that utilitarianism is extremely demanding, potentially requiring extreme sacrifices and inequality.
It is therefore interesting that it is the only decision procedure which does not violate one of these seemingly reasonable assumptions.
Ah, my mistake â I had heard this definition before, which seems slightly different.
Probably I was wrong here. After reading this abstract, I realize that the way Norcross wrote about it is compatible with a weaker claim that linear aggregation of utility too. I think I just assumed that he must mean linear aggregation of utility, because everything else would seem weirdly arbitrary. :)
I changed it to this â curious if you still find it jarring?
Less so! The âtotalâ still indicates the same conclusion I thought would be jumping the gun a bit, but if thatâs your takeaway itâs certainly fine to leave it. Personally I would just write âutilitarianismâ instead of âtotal utilitarianism.â
I used preferences about restaurants as an example because that seemed like something people can relate to easily, but thatâs just an example. The theorem is compatible with hedonic utilitarianism. (In that case, the theorem would just prove that the groupâs utility function is the sum of each individualâs happiness.)
In this case, I think itâs harder to argue that we should care about ex ante expected individual hedonistic utility and for the 1st and 3rd axioms, because we had rationality based on preferences and something like Pareto to support these axioms before, but we could now just be concerned with the distribution of hedonistic utility in the universe, which leaves room for prioritarianism and egalitarianism. I think the only ânon-paternalisticâ and possibly objective way to aggregate hedonistic utility within an individual (over their life and/âor over uncertainty) would be to start from individual preferences/âattitudes/âdesires but just ignore concerns not about hedonism and non-hedonistic preferences, i.e. an externalist account of hedonism. Roger Crisp defends internalism in âHedonism Reconsideredâ, and defines the two terms this way:
Two types of theory of enjoyment are outlined-internalism, according to which enjoyment has some special âfeeling toneâ, and externalism, according to which enjoyment is any kind of experience to which we take some special attitude, such as that of desire.
Otherwise, I donât think thereâs any reason to believe thereâs an objective common cardinal scale for suffering and pleasure, even if there were a scale for suffering and a separate scale for pleasure. Suffering and pleasure donât use exactly the same parts of the brain, and suffering isnât just an âoppositeâ pattern to pleasure. Relying on mixed states, observing judgements when both suffering and pleasure are happening at the same time might seem promising, but these judgements happen at a higher level and probably wouldnât be consistent between people, e.g. you could have two people with exactly the same suffering and pleasure subsystems, but with different aggregating systems.
Thanks for the comment!
Hmm, I wasnât trying to suggest that, but I might have accidentally implied something. I would be curious what you are pointing to?
I used preferences about restaurants as an example because that seemed like something people can relate to easily, but thatâs just an example. The theorem is compatible with hedonic utilitarianism. (In that case, the theorem would just prove that the groupâs utility function is the sum of each individualâs happiness.)
I donât think that this theorem says much about who you aggregate. Itâs just simply stating that if you aggregate some group of persons in a certain way, then that aggregation must take the form of addition.
I agree it doesnât say much, see e.g. Michaelâs comment.
In that case, it would IMO be better to change âtotal utilitarianismâ to âutilitarianismâ in the article. Utilitarianism is different from other forms of consequentialism in that it uses thoroughgoing aggregation. Isnât that what Harsanyiâs theorem mainly shows? It doesnât really add any intuitions about population ethics. Mentioning the repugnant conclusion in this context feels premature.
Hmm, it does show that itâs a linear addition of utilities (as opposed to, say, the sum of their logarithms). So I think itâs stronger than saying just âthoroughgoing aggregationâ.
Iâm not very familiar with the terminology here, but I remember that in this paper, Alastair Norcross used the term âthoroughgoing aggregationâ for what seems to be linear addition of utilities in particular. Thatâs what I had in mind anyway, so Iâm not sure I believe anything different form you. The reason I commented above was because I donât understand the choice of âtotal utilitarianismâ instead of just âutilitarianism.â Doesnât every form of utilitarianism use linear addition of utilities in a case where population size remains fixed? But only total utilitarianism implies the repugnant conclusion. Your conclusion section IMO suggests that Harsanyiâs theorem (which takes a case where population size is indeed fixed) does something to help motivate total utilitarianism over other forms of utilitarianism, such as prior-existence utilitarianism, negative utilitarianism or average utilitarianism. You already acknowledged in your reply further above to that it doesnât do much of that. Thatâs why I suggested rephrasing your conclusion section. Alternatively, you could also explain in what ways you might think the utilitarian alternatives to total utilitarianism are contrived somehow or not in line with Harsanyiâs assumptions. And probably Iâm missing something about how you think about all of this, because the rest of the article seemed really excellent and clear to me. I just find the conclusion section really jarring.
Ah, my mistake â I had heard this definition before, which seems slightly different.
Thanks for the suggestion â always tricky to figure out what a âstraightforwardâ consequence is in philosophy.
I changed it to this â curious if you still find it jarring?
Probably I was wrong here. After reading this abstract, I realize that the way Norcross wrote about it is compatible with a weaker claim that linear aggregation of utility too. I think I just assumed that he must mean linear aggregation of utility, because everything else would seem weirdly arbitrary. :)
Less so! The âtotalâ still indicates the same conclusion I thought would be jumping the gun a bit, but if thatâs your takeaway itâs certainly fine to leave it. Personally I would just write âutilitarianismâ instead of âtotal utilitarianism.â
In this case, I think itâs harder to argue that we should care about ex ante expected individual hedonistic utility and for the 1st and 3rd axioms, because we had rationality based on preferences and something like Pareto to support these axioms before, but we could now just be concerned with the distribution of hedonistic utility in the universe, which leaves room for prioritarianism and egalitarianism. I think the only ânon-paternalisticâ and possibly objective way to aggregate hedonistic utility within an individual (over their life and/âor over uncertainty) would be to start from individual preferences/âattitudes/âdesires but just ignore concerns not about hedonism and non-hedonistic preferences, i.e. an externalist account of hedonism. Roger Crisp defends internalism in âHedonism Reconsideredâ, and defines the two terms this way:
Otherwise, I donât think thereâs any reason to believe thereâs an objective common cardinal scale for suffering and pleasure, even if there were a scale for suffering and a separate scale for pleasure. Suffering and pleasure donât use exactly the same parts of the brain, and suffering isnât just an âoppositeâ pattern to pleasure. Relying on mixed states, observing judgements when both suffering and pleasure are happening at the same time might seem promising, but these judgements happen at a higher level and probably wouldnât be consistent between people, e.g. you could have two people with exactly the same suffering and pleasure subsystems, but with different aggregating systems.
Iâm personally more sympathetic to externalism. With antifrustrationism (there are actually arguments for antifrustrationism; see also my comment here), externalism leads to a negative hedonistic view (which I discuss further here).