What specific terminal value or values are you optimizing towards? And, what is the “our cause” that you refer to above?
Human population growth , being able successfully support 15⁄20 billions humans on our planet , while making sure that each and everyone of them receives the daily dose of calories and proteins necessary to fully develop mentally and physically , get connected to infrastructure and cyberinfrastructure so that we would have more brainpower to solve our problems . People think that with automation and machine learning we should diminish our population , in reality humans will be useful to keep around (the more the better ) up until the very second before a recursively improving artificial general intelligence is switched on , and at that point it won’t really matter how many humans lived on our planet because we did things correctly (correctly understand consciousness/flow of consciousness and assign the goal of protecting our consciousness/flow of consciousness to the AGI ) we’d be looking at living much longer than even the most optimist transhumanists think
Here you seem to suggest that these terminal values are not just your values but are the values of all rational people. If so, why do you believe this?
Because once a person’s basic needs are satisfied the rational thing to do is to make sure that such needs will be met in the near and remote future , people in 1st world countries are sure of that in the near future , but the further we look into the future the less sure we are that at any given point all our basic needs would be satisfied , not to mention 3rd world country where people don’t know if they’d be alive 10 or 20 days in the future . People who spend resources (brainpower , money , attention...) on stuff like entertainment , fashion and luxury goods are taking for granted that in the future their basic needs would be satisfied , which is a false assumption
You have argued against the amount of influence that CEOs have in deciding what products should be produced, and here you seem to make the free-market argument that consumers voting with their wallets is a good way for society to decide what products should be produced. But, consumers frequently choose to buy luxury goods, professionally produced entertainment and meat, and at least sometimes appear to value biodiversity. How do you reconcile your pro consumer-choice pro free-market stance with the fact that consumers frequently choose to buy and value things that you think they ought not buy and value?
The “wallet vote” of those spending ( not investing or donating) more than 75k (excluding healthcare) per year should be ignored , they clearly have mental problems and their biggest daily concern is to outdo the Jonses or gain societal status by exhibiting an opulent lifestyle and should be treated the same way we treat alcholics and drug addicts… but like I said I am very well aware that change imposed from the top doesn’t ever work so rational people should not only live a frugal lifestyle and consume less resources (brainpower , money ..) as possible on stuff which doesn’t produce any utility (entertainment , sport , fashion ) but also convince other people to stop their vanity fueled lunacy , for their own sake ( see Super Bowl example) and for society in it’s entirety.
Also CEOs are more often than not irrational people , 90% of the times their goal is to forcefully push down people’s throats a service or a product they don’t need (so they are basically doing the opposite of convincing people to avoid wasting money and brainpower on stuff they don’t need) in order to become rich and/or famous and buy stuff they don’t need themselves....
10% of the CEOs want to forcefully push down people’s throats products and services they need , so they’d be able to live frugally and use that money for financing research and all the other important things ; unfortunately money =/= brainpower and they’d be never able to offset the damage they caused ; this is the case of the billionaire friend of this community Peter Thiel (almost , he doesn’t quite live frugally) , when he invested in FB he was already into transhumanism , life extension , and WBE , so he probably thought that helping propel an idea like FB would have enabled him to carry on his real interests , 10 years later the progresses made in such fields are insignificant compared with what they could have been if young minds throughout the globe hadn’t been poisoned by such tech fueled debauchery . A book on transhumanism by Ray Kurzweil or Nick Bostrom , no matter how interesting it is can’t compete with the hot flirty russian girl literally 3 clicks away , so the minds (especially the young ones) that rational people were slowly beginning to convince end up wandering away further than ever before , overwhelmed by new overstimulating shiny things which would leave them scrambling for help when they’d learn that they have only 6 months left to live and that new experimental treatment is very expansive and has low chances of saving their lives
Human population growth , being able successfully support 15⁄20 billions humans on our planet , while making sure that each and everyone of them receives the daily dose of calories and proteins necessary to fully develop mentally and physically , get connected to infrastructure and cyberinfrastructure so that we would have more brainpower to solve our problems .
I am unclear on why this is one of your goals. Is a large population:
A terminal goal?
An instrumental goal, because the more people that are working on life extension, FAI, or whatever, the sooner we will achieve it?
Not a goal at all, but you feel that human population is headed towards 15⁄20 billion, and you wish for all of those people to have their basic needs met?
If #1, it is unclear to me why you would think that a large population is so desirable that you are willing to give up biodiversity, meat, pandas, Netflix, etc., to achieve it.
If #2, I am not confident that a huge population is really the best/fastest way to achieve those things. A large population can create problems of its own (overcrowding, competition for resources, etc.), and solving those problems could divert attention from whatever it is that you want society to achieve.
Also CEOs are more often than not irrational people , 90% of the times their goal is to forcefully push down people’s throats a service or a product they don’t need
IMO you are overstating the ability of a CEO to push products down anyone’s throat (as I am sure anyone who has ever tried to market an unpopular product could attest). Yes, corporations do engage in marketing, promotion, advertising, etc., but ultimately it is the consumer that makes the choice as to what products to buy. A company that is successful in selling a lot of products is, more often than not, a company that is successful in understanding what products consumers want and is successful in producing those products. By and large, people buy meat, luxury products, professionally produced entertainment, etc., because they really want those things rather than because a corporation forced those products upon them.
Also, I don’t know that I would call most CEOs irrational; perhaps they are acting rationally given their goals (which may differ from yours).
2 An instrumental goal, because the more people that are working on life extension, FAI, or whatever, the sooner we will achieve it
Exactly
If #1, it is unclear to me why you would think that a large population is so desirable that you are willing to give up biodiversity, meat, pandas, Netflix, etc., to achieve it.
To get there (WBE , life extension , the maintenance approach by Audrey de Grey , understanding of consciousness , AGI that would preserve our consciousness) faster than we would otherwise
If #2, I am not confident that a huge population is really the best/fastest way to achieve those things. A large population can create problems of its own (overcrowding, competition for resources, etc.), and solving those problems could divert attention from whatever it is that you want society to achieve.
That’s the reason why we must optimize resources allocation in every possible way , cutting all the unnecessary (entertainment , jewelry , yacht , meat , sports , fashion) and redirect our effort toward the important stuff
By and large, people buy meat, luxury products, professionally produced entertainment, etc.
Because they don’t know what kind of society they are giving up by pursuing those things and not optimizing resources instead , but CEOs are supposed to be smart people , they should know better , instead of enlightening people they sell them the crap they want in order to elevate themselves and be in a position which would enable them to buy all the crap they want . Few of them want to convert money earned by selling crap into progress towards that kind of society , but money are only useful when somebody on the other side accepts it to buy food and other stuff , too bad they are too busy buying crap to care about WBE
Also, I don’t know that I would call most CEOs irrational; perhaps they are acting rationally given their goals (which may differ from yours).
If their goal is becoming the 0,000001% in a suboptimal society instead of being an average citizen in a optimized society , then yes , they are irrational , statistics proved this time and time again , what kills the billionaire is the exact same pathology that kills the plumber....the billionaire might have a 28-32 months advantage in accessing a new experimental treatment , but that doesn’t cost billions of dollars , 5-10 millions will suffice
If their goal is becoming the 0,000001% in a suboptimal society instead of being an average citizen in a optimized society , then yes , they are irrational , statistics proved this time and time again , what kills the billionaire is the exact same pathology that kills the plumber
I don’t think that you can use statistics to prove that a goal is irrational in this way. You appear to be working from an unstated assumption that everyone’s terminal goals are identical to yours—a high weighting on long lifespan and a negligible weighting on everything else. In fact, this is not the case; people’s terminal goals vary.
The thing is, no one needs to align his/her goals to those of the majority. As long as he/she does not intrude upon the rights of others, each person can pursue his/her own goals. The great thing about “voting with your wallet” (as you put it), is that it is not a winner-take-all vote. You can use your resources towards your vision of maximal life expectancy, someone who values biodiversity, panda habitats, etc., can work on or contribute towards conservation efforts, and the live-for-the-moment hedonist can spend his/her money on luxury goods, etc. In fact, most people are not exclusively in any one of those camps but rather have a complex mix of goals; that is why a one-size-fits-all set of spending and career priorities is unreasonable.
What about the right not to be killed? I’d live up to 5-10 years more if society valued longevity as much as I do...society would be defacto responsible for my premature death
Your right to pursue your goal of maximal life expectancy does not imply that anyone else has an obligation to dedicate his/her career or assets towards your goal. However, the arrangement is reciprocal; no one can compel you to abandon your goals and dedicate your career and assets towards his/her goals either.
What about laws in place to punish those who run over people and kill them because their goal is to get wherever they need to go as fast as possible ? We punish these people..also we punish those who drive recklessly because they harm society as a whole by pursuing their goal
Fortunately we have laws to mediate conflicts in individuals’ goals and desires. The law in most jurisdictions sees a difference between causing the death of another person by driving in an unsafe and illegal manner, and failing to dedicate one’s career and assets towards the goal of maximal life expectancy. IMO, the law gets this distinction right.
Shouldn’t you be overwhelmingly concerned with increasing fertility, then? Given the current trends, the human population is expected to stabilize (or maybe even peak) at a level below 10 billion people. Some first-world countries (e.g. Japan) already have a declining population.
Because once a person’s basic needs are satisfied the rational thing to do is to make sure that such needs will be met in the near and remote future
Beans and ammo! X-)
Does this mean that you explicitly reject Maslow’s Pyramid? Humans should never want anything other than their basic needs and if these are currently satisfied, humans should continue working at reducing the uncertainty of these needs being met in the future?
stuff which doesn’t produce any utility (entertainment , sport , fashion )
You have an unusual definition of utility. What is it? How do you define utility?
they clearly have mental problems
*snort*
A book on transhumanism by Ray Kurzweil or Nick Bostrom , no matter how interesting it is can’t compete with the hot flirty russian girl literally 3 clicks away
Are you, um, speaking from personal experience? :-D Because clearly people read these books. Maybe there are.. gaps? between chasing hot Russian chicks? (and studs, I presume)
Shouldn’t you be overwhelmingly concerned with increasing fertility, then? Given the current trends, the human population is expected to stabilize (or maybe even peak) at a level below 10 billion people. Some first-world countries (e.g. Japan) already have a declining population.
I am , but at the same time overwhelming poverty signals that we must be more efficient in how we allocate resources too...having 15 billions humans living on Earth but only having 4 billions actively participating in problem solving is not the goal
Does this mean that you explicitly reject Maslow’s Pyramid? Humans should never want anything other than their basic needs and if these are currently satisfied, humans should continue working at reducing the uncertainty of these needs being met in the future?
I would not say I reject it , for me the cutoff should be at the friends level , or even better allies , likeminded people to share thoughts and trying to change society for the better with the ultimate goal to live longer
You have an unusual definition of utility. What is it? How do you define utility?
Everything below the Maslow pyramid cutoff I just described
Are you, um, speaking from personal experience? :-D Because clearly people read these books. Maybe there are.. gaps? between chasing hot Russian chicks? (and studs, I presume)
We’re talking about a really small percentage of the population
the cutoff should be at the friends level , or even better allies
Huh? Maslow’s Pyramid goes Physiology → Safety → Belonging → Esteem → Self-actualization. It has nothing to do with how wide your circle of concern is.
with the ultimate goal to live longer
Ah, there we go.
Do you think other people MUST have the same goal and if they don’t they are mistaken?
Do you think other people MUST have the same goal and if they don’t they are mistaken?
Well yes , because if ask you the question today you’ll answer me that you want to live one more day , if I ask you the same question tomorrow you’ll still answer me that you want to live one more day....and so forth… then you must plan in advance in order to make it happen ; If you fail to plan ; you plan to fail
That was one of Eliezer’s worse arguments, for a number of reasons. First of all, it is literally false. If you are actually asking what would happen if that were to happen in reality, here’s the answer: each day there is a finite probability that you will say that you do not want to live another day. And there is no reason for that probability to go down infinitely, so in the limit you can be quite sure that you will one day say that you do not want to live another day.
Second, and more empirically, many people in their 80s say they are basically waiting to die, and not because their lives are awful, but because they think they lived long enough. And perhaps they will still say they want one more day, but perhaps not, especially for the above reason.
Third, time inconsistency. Even if you actually say you want to live another day each day, that does not prove that you want to live forever, anymore than if there is an alcoholic who says he wants a drink whenever he is offered, that means he wants to remain an alcoholic.
Second, and more empirically, many people in their 80s say they are basically waiting to die, and not because their lives are awful, but because they think they lived long enough. And perhaps they will still say they want one more day, but perhaps not, especially for the above reason.
They are simply , wrong , or if you prefer they have a limited vision , they think that they have experienced everything that there is to life , but if they lived longer new cool stuff to experience would emerge and so forth
Well yes , because if ask you the question today you’ll answer me that you want to live one more day
You’re forgetting that there is a cost to everything.
This goes back to my question about 60 years as a rich first-worlder or 80 years as a tropical subsistence farmer. Or, if you want, it goes back to at least the Achilles’ choice in Iliad.
This goes back to my question about 60 years as a rich first-worlder or 80 years as a tropical subsistence farmer. Or, if you want, it goes back to at least the Achilles’ choice in Iliad.
I’ll take 80 years as a subsistence farmer over 60 years as Bill “fired my co-founder and childhood friend while he was dying of cancer” Gates any time , because he’ll run out of options and will have his freedom of action reduced to a big fat zero 20 years earlier than the farmer
Yes, as your personal choice. But the interesting question is whether you consider people who make a different choice to be just wrong or mentally ill.
You do recognize that other people are different from you..?
Drug addicts and alcoholics are different from me too....but society paints them as people with disturbs who need to be cured , because those of us not drinking and not doing drugs somehow know better than them and know what is better for them (and for us given that we always calculate the cost of drugs on society , healthcare and economy)
Also would you consider moral somebody who sells a bunch of useless rocks like opals , rubies....for 200k? Society paints drug dealers as evil making money off innocent people’s poor decisions , I don’t know how is that different from a jeweler selling a ruby for 200k , plus people wasting resources mining , polishing , selling and collecting these useless rocks are a cost for society exactly like drug addicts
because those of us not drinking and not doing drugs somehow know better than them
Careful there. Societies’ opinions on what’s proper and what’s not… change. A few centuries ago if you weren’t a Christian in Europe, you were a person “with disturbs” who needs to be cured, by a bonfire if necessary (to save your immortal soul, of course).
Also would you consider moral somebody who sells a bunch of useless rocks like opals , rubies....for 200k?
Sure. What’s the problem with voluntary transactions? They are useless to you, but not to other people. Do you know what’s useless and what’s not better than everyone else?
Sure. What’s the problem with voluntary transactions? They are useless to you, but not to other people. Do you know what’s useless and what’s not better than everyone else?
A person who regularly buys opiates is making a voluntary transaction too , society acts to stop these transactions because they damage collectivity (costs for society being : healthcare , unemployment , crime , loss of productivity...) , by the same token you could argue that mining , polishing , transporting and selling a useless rock like a ruby has some undesirable costs for society
By the same token you could argue for a lot of things—from pointing out that publicly expressing doubt in Beloved Great Leader “has some undesirable costs for society” to just putting grannies onto ice floes.
Ok , so does this mean that you’re in favor of a depenalization of both commerce and consumption of all drugs , alcohol and prostitution with no age restriction?
With age restrictions (because minors are limited in the consent they can give) but yes, I am in favour of decriminalisation of sex, drugs, and alcohol.
I feel this is a good place for a Hunter S. Thompson quote X-D
I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they’ve always worked for me.
I’ll take 80 years as a subsistence farmer over 60 years as Bill “fired my co-founder and childhood friend while he was dying of cancer” Gates any time
I would have supposed that Bill Gates was on your “good CEO list” (if you have such a list) due to the amount of money he has contributed to vaccine development and generally to improving health, longevity and quality of life in developing nations.
Human population growth , being able successfully support 15⁄20 billions humans on our planet , while making sure that each and everyone of them receives the daily dose of calories and proteins necessary to fully develop mentally and physically , get connected to infrastructure and cyberinfrastructure so that we would have more brainpower to solve our problems . People think that with automation and machine learning we should diminish our population , in reality humans will be useful to keep around (the more the better ) up until the very second before a recursively improving artificial general intelligence is switched on , and at that point it won’t really matter how many humans lived on our planet because we did things correctly (correctly understand consciousness/flow of consciousness and assign the goal of protecting our consciousness/flow of consciousness to the AGI ) we’d be looking at living much longer than even the most optimist transhumanists think
Because once a person’s basic needs are satisfied the rational thing to do is to make sure that such needs will be met in the near and remote future , people in 1st world countries are sure of that in the near future , but the further we look into the future the less sure we are that at any given point all our basic needs would be satisfied , not to mention 3rd world country where people don’t know if they’d be alive 10 or 20 days in the future . People who spend resources (brainpower , money , attention...) on stuff like entertainment , fashion and luxury goods are taking for granted that in the future their basic needs would be satisfied , which is a false assumption
The “wallet vote” of those spending ( not investing or donating) more than 75k (excluding healthcare) per year should be ignored , they clearly have mental problems and their biggest daily concern is to outdo the Jonses or gain societal status by exhibiting an opulent lifestyle and should be treated the same way we treat alcholics and drug addicts… but like I said I am very well aware that change imposed from the top doesn’t ever work so rational people should not only live a frugal lifestyle and consume less resources (brainpower , money ..) as possible on stuff which doesn’t produce any utility (entertainment , sport , fashion ) but also convince other people to stop their vanity fueled lunacy , for their own sake ( see Super Bowl example) and for society in it’s entirety.
Also CEOs are more often than not irrational people , 90% of the times their goal is to forcefully push down people’s throats a service or a product they don’t need (so they are basically doing the opposite of convincing people to avoid wasting money and brainpower on stuff they don’t need) in order to become rich and/or famous and buy stuff they don’t need themselves....
10% of the CEOs want to forcefully push down people’s throats products and services they need , so they’d be able to live frugally and use that money for financing research and all the other important things ; unfortunately money =/= brainpower and they’d be never able to offset the damage they caused ; this is the case of the billionaire friend of this community Peter Thiel (almost , he doesn’t quite live frugally) , when he invested in FB he was already into transhumanism , life extension , and WBE , so he probably thought that helping propel an idea like FB would have enabled him to carry on his real interests , 10 years later the progresses made in such fields are insignificant compared with what they could have been if young minds throughout the globe hadn’t been poisoned by such tech fueled debauchery . A book on transhumanism by Ray Kurzweil or Nick Bostrom , no matter how interesting it is can’t compete with the hot flirty russian girl literally 3 clicks away , so the minds (especially the young ones) that rational people were slowly beginning to convince end up wandering away further than ever before , overwhelmed by new overstimulating shiny things which would leave them scrambling for help when they’d learn that they have only 6 months left to live and that new experimental treatment is very expansive and has low chances of saving their lives
I am unclear on why this is one of your goals. Is a large population:
A terminal goal?
An instrumental goal, because the more people that are working on life extension, FAI, or whatever, the sooner we will achieve it?
Not a goal at all, but you feel that human population is headed towards 15⁄20 billion, and you wish for all of those people to have their basic needs met?
If #1, it is unclear to me why you would think that a large population is so desirable that you are willing to give up biodiversity, meat, pandas, Netflix, etc., to achieve it.
If #2, I am not confident that a huge population is really the best/fastest way to achieve those things. A large population can create problems of its own (overcrowding, competition for resources, etc.), and solving those problems could divert attention from whatever it is that you want society to achieve.
IMO you are overstating the ability of a CEO to push products down anyone’s throat (as I am sure anyone who has ever tried to market an unpopular product could attest). Yes, corporations do engage in marketing, promotion, advertising, etc., but ultimately it is the consumer that makes the choice as to what products to buy. A company that is successful in selling a lot of products is, more often than not, a company that is successful in understanding what products consumers want and is successful in producing those products. By and large, people buy meat, luxury products, professionally produced entertainment, etc., because they really want those things rather than because a corporation forced those products upon them.
Also, I don’t know that I would call most CEOs irrational; perhaps they are acting rationally given their goals (which may differ from yours).
Exactly
To get there (WBE , life extension , the maintenance approach by Audrey de Grey , understanding of consciousness , AGI that would preserve our consciousness) faster than we would otherwise
That’s the reason why we must optimize resources allocation in every possible way , cutting all the unnecessary (entertainment , jewelry , yacht , meat , sports , fashion) and redirect our effort toward the important stuff
Because they don’t know what kind of society they are giving up by pursuing those things and not optimizing resources instead , but CEOs are supposed to be smart people , they should know better , instead of enlightening people they sell them the crap they want in order to elevate themselves and be in a position which would enable them to buy all the crap they want . Few of them want to convert money earned by selling crap into progress towards that kind of society , but money are only useful when somebody on the other side accepts it to buy food and other stuff , too bad they are too busy buying crap to care about WBE
If their goal is becoming the 0,000001% in a suboptimal society instead of being an average citizen in a optimized society , then yes , they are irrational , statistics proved this time and time again , what kills the billionaire is the exact same pathology that kills the plumber....the billionaire might have a 28-32 months advantage in accessing a new experimental treatment , but that doesn’t cost billions of dollars , 5-10 millions will suffice
I don’t think that you can use statistics to prove that a goal is irrational in this way. You appear to be working from an unstated assumption that everyone’s terminal goals are identical to yours—a high weighting on long lifespan and a negligible weighting on everything else. In fact, this is not the case; people’s terminal goals vary.
Well , in that case the interests of the majority would prevail
The thing is, no one needs to align his/her goals to those of the majority. As long as he/she does not intrude upon the rights of others, each person can pursue his/her own goals. The great thing about “voting with your wallet” (as you put it), is that it is not a winner-take-all vote. You can use your resources towards your vision of maximal life expectancy, someone who values biodiversity, panda habitats, etc., can work on or contribute towards conservation efforts, and the live-for-the-moment hedonist can spend his/her money on luxury goods, etc. In fact, most people are not exclusively in any one of those camps but rather have a complex mix of goals; that is why a one-size-fits-all set of spending and career priorities is unreasonable.
What about the right not to be killed? I’d live up to 5-10 years more if society valued longevity as much as I do...society would be defacto responsible for my premature death
Your right to pursue your goal of maximal life expectancy does not imply that anyone else has an obligation to dedicate his/her career or assets towards your goal. However, the arrangement is reciprocal; no one can compel you to abandon your goals and dedicate your career and assets towards his/her goals either.
What about laws in place to punish those who run over people and kill them because their goal is to get wherever they need to go as fast as possible ? We punish these people..also we punish those who drive recklessly because they harm society as a whole by pursuing their goal
Fortunately we have laws to mediate conflicts in individuals’ goals and desires. The law in most jurisdictions sees a difference between causing the death of another person by driving in an unsafe and illegal manner, and failing to dedicate one’s career and assets towards the goal of maximal life expectancy. IMO, the law gets this distinction right.
If this is what you meant by “Well , in that case the interests of the majority would prevail”, then yes, I agree with that.
Shouldn’t you be overwhelmingly concerned with increasing fertility, then? Given the current trends, the human population is expected to stabilize (or maybe even peak) at a level below 10 billion people. Some first-world countries (e.g. Japan) already have a declining population.
Beans and ammo! X-)
Does this mean that you explicitly reject Maslow’s Pyramid? Humans should never want anything other than their basic needs and if these are currently satisfied, humans should continue working at reducing the uncertainty of these needs being met in the future?
You have an unusual definition of utility. What is it? How do you define utility?
*snort*
Are you, um, speaking from personal experience? :-D Because clearly people read these books. Maybe there are.. gaps? between chasing hot Russian chicks? (and studs, I presume)
I am , but at the same time overwhelming poverty signals that we must be more efficient in how we allocate resources too...having 15 billions humans living on Earth but only having 4 billions actively participating in problem solving is not the goal
I would not say I reject it , for me the cutoff should be at the friends level , or even better allies , likeminded people to share thoughts and trying to change society for the better with the ultimate goal to live longer
Everything below the Maslow pyramid cutoff I just described
We’re talking about a really small percentage of the population
Huh? Maslow’s Pyramid goes Physiology → Safety → Belonging → Esteem → Self-actualization. It has nothing to do with how wide your circle of concern is.
Ah, there we go.
Do you think other people MUST have the same goal and if they don’t they are mistaken?
Do you think other people MUST have the same goal and if they don’t they are mistaken?
Well yes , because if ask you the question today you’ll answer me that you want to live one more day , if I ask you the same question tomorrow you’ll still answer me that you want to live one more day....and so forth… then you must plan in advance in order to make it happen ; If you fail to plan ; you plan to fail
That was one of Eliezer’s worse arguments, for a number of reasons. First of all, it is literally false. If you are actually asking what would happen if that were to happen in reality, here’s the answer: each day there is a finite probability that you will say that you do not want to live another day. And there is no reason for that probability to go down infinitely, so in the limit you can be quite sure that you will one day say that you do not want to live another day.
Second, and more empirically, many people in their 80s say they are basically waiting to die, and not because their lives are awful, but because they think they lived long enough. And perhaps they will still say they want one more day, but perhaps not, especially for the above reason.
Third, time inconsistency. Even if you actually say you want to live another day each day, that does not prove that you want to live forever, anymore than if there is an alcoholic who says he wants a drink whenever he is offered, that means he wants to remain an alcoholic.
They are simply , wrong , or if you prefer they have a limited vision , they think that they have experienced everything that there is to life , but if they lived longer new cool stuff to experience would emerge and so forth
The ironic thing is that they probably know more about it than you do, and when you are their age you might think the same way they do.
You’re forgetting that there is a cost to everything.
This goes back to my question about 60 years as a rich first-worlder or 80 years as a tropical subsistence farmer. Or, if you want, it goes back to at least the Achilles’ choice in Iliad.
I’ll take 80 years as a subsistence farmer over 60 years as Bill “fired my co-founder and childhood friend while he was dying of cancer” Gates any time , because he’ll run out of options and will have his freedom of action reduced to a big fat zero 20 years earlier than the farmer
Yes, as your personal choice. But the interesting question is whether you consider people who make a different choice to be just wrong or mentally ill.
So are you claiming that you DON’T consider a person who spends 200k in jewelry to be mentally ill ? 200k for a bunch of rocks...
Yes, I do not.
You do recognize that other people are different from you..?
Drug addicts and alcoholics are different from me too....but society paints them as people with disturbs who need to be cured , because those of us not drinking and not doing drugs somehow know better than them and know what is better for them (and for us given that we always calculate the cost of drugs on society , healthcare and economy)
Also would you consider moral somebody who sells a bunch of useless rocks like opals , rubies....for 200k? Society paints drug dealers as evil making money off innocent people’s poor decisions , I don’t know how is that different from a jeweler selling a ruby for 200k , plus people wasting resources mining , polishing , selling and collecting these useless rocks are a cost for society exactly like drug addicts
Careful there. Societies’ opinions on what’s proper and what’s not… change. A few centuries ago if you weren’t a Christian in Europe, you were a person “with disturbs” who needs to be cured, by a bonfire if necessary (to save your immortal soul, of course).
Sure. What’s the problem with voluntary transactions? They are useless to you, but not to other people. Do you know what’s useless and what’s not better than everyone else?
A person who regularly buys opiates is making a voluntary transaction too , society acts to stop these transactions because they damage collectivity (costs for society being : healthcare , unemployment , crime , loss of productivity...) , by the same token you could argue that mining , polishing , transporting and selling a useless rock like a ruby has some undesirable costs for society
By the same token you could argue for a lot of things—from pointing out that publicly expressing doubt in Beloved Great Leader “has some undesirable costs for society” to just putting grannies onto ice floes.
Ok , so does this mean that you’re in favor of a depenalization of both commerce and consumption of all drugs , alcohol and prostitution with no age restriction?
With age restrictions (because minors are limited in the consent they can give) but yes, I am in favour of decriminalisation of sex, drugs, and alcohol.
I feel this is a good place for a Hunter S. Thompson quote X-D
I would have supposed that Bill Gates was on your “good CEO list” (if you have such a list) due to the amount of money he has contributed to vaccine development and generally to improving health, longevity and quality of life in developing nations.