If you genuinely attached infinite utility to your family’s lives, then we could remove the finite terms in your utility function without affecting it’s output. You are not valuing their lives above all else (...)
You do have a point, but there is another explanation to resolve that, see this comment.
We still have a fundamental disagreement on whether rationality is in any way involved when reflecting on your terminal values. I claim that rationality will help the closet murderer who is firm in valuing pain and suffering the same as the altruist, the paperclipper or the FAI. It helps us in pursuing our goals, not in setting the axioms of our value systems (the terminal values).
There is no aspect of Bayes or any reasoning mechanism that tells you whether to value happy humans or dead humans. Reasoning helps you in better achieving your goals, nefarious or angelic as they may be.
My point is that, while an agent that is not confused about its values will not change them in response to rationality (obviously,) one that is confused will. For example, a Nazi realizing Jews are people after all.
Hairyfigment’s answer would also work. The point is that they are as worthy of moral consideration as everyone else, and, to a lesser extent, that they aren’t congenitally predisposed to undermine civilization and so on and so forth.
You do have a point, but there is another explanation to resolve that, see this comment.
We still have a fundamental disagreement on whether rationality is in any way involved when reflecting on your terminal values. I claim that rationality will help the closet murderer who is firm in valuing pain and suffering the same as the altruist, the paperclipper or the FAI. It helps us in pursuing our goals, not in setting the axioms of our value systems (the terminal values).
There is no aspect of Bayes or any reasoning mechanism that tells you whether to value happy humans or dead humans. Reasoning helps you in better achieving your goals, nefarious or angelic as they may be.
I see your psychopath and raise you one Nazi.
I’m sorry, does that label impact our debate whether rationality implies terminal values?
My point is that, while an agent that is not confused about its values will not change them in response to rationality (obviously,) one that is confused will. For example, a Nazi realizing Jews are people after all.
Sorry if that wasn’t clear.
Taboo “people”.
‘Share many human characteristics with the Nazi, and in particular suffered in similar ways from the economic conditions that helped produce Nazism.’
“not Evil Mutants”
Hairyfigment’s answer would also work. The point is that they are as worthy of moral consideration as everyone else, and, to a lesser extent, that they aren’t congenitally predisposed to undermine civilization and so on and so forth.