Nitpick: most utilitarians would refuse to harvest the taxi driver’s organs, because bad things happen where people don’t trust doctors.
But yeah, that’s pretty much what we think (see the trolley problem). Utilitarians view “Should I kill one to save two?” as a choice between one death and two deaths, which is pretty straightforward. Whether you have blood on your hands isn’t relevant—your feelings of guilt aren’t worth one human life.
And refusing linear aggregation is disquieting as well. The sick child pleads for medication, and you rush to pay for it—then someone tells you “There are a million healthy children over there” and you say “Okay then” and go buy yourself a laptop.
I have a related question, as one still new to lesswrong: are there existing sequences on the philosophy behind/connected to utilitarianism, by which I mean, the notion that human lives, or life in general, has value? I assume there is either a sequence regarding this, or else a consensus which is generally accepted by the readers of this site (a consensus which, I hope, is nevertheless written out somewhere).
Nitpick: most utilitarians would refuse to harvest the taxi driver’s organs, because bad things happen where people don’t trust doctors.
But yeah, that’s pretty much what we think (see the trolley problem). Utilitarians view “Should I kill one to save two?” as a choice between one death and two deaths, which is pretty straightforward. Whether you have blood on your hands isn’t relevant—your feelings of guilt aren’t worth one human life.
And refusing linear aggregation is disquieting as well. The sick child pleads for medication, and you rush to pay for it—then someone tells you “There are a million healthy children over there” and you say “Okay then” and go buy yourself a laptop.
I have a related question, as one still new to lesswrong: are there existing sequences on the philosophy behind/connected to utilitarianism, by which I mean, the notion that human lives, or life in general, has value? I assume there is either a sequence regarding this, or else a consensus which is generally accepted by the readers of this site (a consensus which, I hope, is nevertheless written out somewhere).