Every one of these complex problems and complex solutions fall away to an egoist. When rationalism is uncoupled from all who are not the rational agent, no paradox of self-preservation vs rationality endures. An egoist may fight or abstain as they see (rational / fit / entertaining). Many have claimed to bridge the is / ought divide, and with a few leaps of faith rationality appears to do so. But I say rationality is a-moral. IF I attack THEN I get your stuff ELSE run away is entirely rational.
A team of rational egoists could invent ways to make their precommitments credible. Then they could e.g. organize a lottery to randomly choose a few of them to sacrifice for the benefit of others.
Assuming that (a) participating in the lottery is better on average than not participating in the lottery, and (b) the precommitments are credible, which means that once you have been chosen by the lottery, it would be worse or impossible to not sacrifice yourself for the benefits of other lottery participants, and (c) it is impossible to get the benefits of the lottery as positive externalities while not participating in the lottery… then a rational egoist would choose to participate in the lottery.
Yeah, the three assumptions would be extremely difficult to fulfill. But there is no law of physics saying that it is impossible.
And as DanielLC suggests, if people have other values beyong their personal profit, that only makes the solution easier.
An egoist can do what they can do, including be on teams and make agreements. But an egoist is not always and only guided by personal profit. That would make a spook, a wheel in the head, of personal profit.
I might be misunderstanding what you wrote, and if I have please correct me. You seem to be saying more than one egoist is needed for egoism to happen. This is not the case.
I think I might be misunderstanding what you wrote.
I thought you were saying that Eliezer was assuming that the people were not egoists, and if they were, it would all fall apart. I was replying that if they weren’t egoists, none of this would be necessary, and it’s intended to show that even egoists can work together if that’s what it takes to win.
It’s also possible that just some of them are egoists. If it’s enough of them, you’d still have to do that stuff Eliezer mentioned.
Every one of these complex problems and complex solutions fall away to an egoist. When rationalism is uncoupled from all who are not the rational agent, no paradox of self-preservation vs rationality endures. An egoist may fight or abstain as they see (rational / fit / entertaining). Many have claimed to bridge the is / ought divide, and with a few leaps of faith rationality appears to do so. But I say rationality is a-moral. IF I attack THEN I get your stuff ELSE run away is entirely rational.
A team of rational egoists could invent ways to make their precommitments credible. Then they could e.g. organize a lottery to randomly choose a few of them to sacrifice for the benefit of others.
Assuming that (a) participating in the lottery is better on average than not participating in the lottery, and (b) the precommitments are credible, which means that once you have been chosen by the lottery, it would be worse or impossible to not sacrifice yourself for the benefits of other lottery participants, and (c) it is impossible to get the benefits of the lottery as positive externalities while not participating in the lottery… then a rational egoist would choose to participate in the lottery.
Yeah, the three assumptions would be extremely difficult to fulfill. But there is no law of physics saying that it is impossible.
And as DanielLC suggests, if people have other values beyong their personal profit, that only makes the solution easier.
An egoist can do what they can do, including be on teams and make agreements. But an egoist is not always and only guided by personal profit. That would make a spook, a wheel in the head, of personal profit.
It’s assuming they’re all egoists. If you’re not an egoist, you wouldn’t need a complex solution to sacrifice the few to save the many.
I might be misunderstanding what you wrote, and if I have please correct me. You seem to be saying more than one egoist is needed for egoism to happen. This is not the case.
I think I might be misunderstanding what you wrote.
I thought you were saying that Eliezer was assuming that the people were not egoists, and if they were, it would all fall apart. I was replying that if they weren’t egoists, none of this would be necessary, and it’s intended to show that even egoists can work together if that’s what it takes to win.
It’s also possible that just some of them are egoists. If it’s enough of them, you’d still have to do that stuff Eliezer mentioned.
What do you mean by “egoist” here?
The egoism of Max Stirner, Dora Marsden and (of course most important of all) myself.