OK, but now decreasing your margin of error until you can make a determination is the most important ethical mission in history. Governments should spend billions of dollars to assemble to brightest teams to calculate which of your two options is better—more lives hang in the balance (on expectation) than would ever live if we colonized the universe with people the size of atoms.
Suppose a trustworthy Omega tells you “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I’m going to cure all residence of country from all diseases in benevolent way (no ironic or evil catches). I’ll leave the country up to you. Give me $5 and the country will be Zimbabwe, or give me nothing and the country will be Tanzania. I’ll give you a couple of minutes to come up with a decision.” You would not think to yourself “Well, I’m not sure which is bigger. My estimates don’t differ by more than my margin of error, so I might as well save the $5 and go with Tanzania”. At least I hope that’s not how you’d make the decision.
OK, but now decreasing your margin of error until you can make a determination is the most important ethical mission in history. Governments should spend billions of dollars to assemble to brightest teams to calculate which of your two options is better—more lives hang in the balance (on expectation) than would ever live if we colonized the universe with people the size of atoms.
Suppose a trustworthy Omega tells you “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I’m going to cure all residence of country from all diseases in benevolent way (no ironic or evil catches). I’ll leave the country up to you. Give me $5 and the country will be Zimbabwe, or give me nothing and the country will be Tanzania. I’ll give you a couple of minutes to come up with a decision.” You would not think to yourself “Well, I’m not sure which is bigger. My estimates don’t differ by more than my margin of error, so I might as well save the $5 and go with Tanzania”. At least I hope that’s not how you’d make the decision.