But as you suggested in the post, the apparently vast amount of suffering isn’t necessarily real? “most cosmic details and human history are probably fake, and many apparent people could be non‑conscious entities”
(However I take the point that doing such simulations can be risky or problematic, e g. if one’s current ideas about consciousness is wrong, or if doing philosophy correctly requires having experienced real suffering.)
I’m in low level chronic pain including as I write this comment, so while I think the entire Andromeda galaxy might be fake, I think at least some suffering must be real, or at least I have the same confidence in my suffering as I do in my consciousness.
You realize that from my perspective, I can’t take this at face value due to “many apparent people could be non‑conscious entities”, right? (Sorry to potentially offend you, but it seems like too obvious an implication to pretend not to be aware of.) I personally am fairly content most of the time but do have memories of suffering. Assuming those memories are real, and your suffering is too, I’m still not sure that justifies calling the simulators “cruel”. The price may well be worth paying, if it potentially helps to avert some greater disaster in the base universe or other simulations, caused by insufficient philosophical understanding, moral blind spots, etc., and there is no better alternative.
Yes, I agree that you can’t give too much weight to my saying I’m in pain because I could be non-conscious from your viewpoint. Assuming all humans are conscious and pain is as it appears to be, there seems to be a lot of unnecessary pain, but yes I could be missing the value of having us experience it.
I’m often in low level chronic pain. Mine isn’t probably as bad as yours, so my life is clearly still net.positive (if you believe that positive emotions can outweigh suffering, which I do). Are you net negative do you think?
But as you suggested in the post, the apparently vast amount of suffering isn’t necessarily real? “most cosmic details and human history are probably fake, and many apparent people could be non‑conscious entities”
(However I take the point that doing such simulations can be risky or problematic, e g. if one’s current ideas about consciousness is wrong, or if doing philosophy correctly requires having experienced real suffering.)
I’m in low level chronic pain including as I write this comment, so while I think the entire Andromeda galaxy might be fake, I think at least some suffering must be real, or at least I have the same confidence in my suffering as I do in my consciousness.
You realize that from my perspective, I can’t take this at face value due to “many apparent people could be non‑conscious entities”, right? (Sorry to potentially offend you, but it seems like too obvious an implication to pretend not to be aware of.) I personally am fairly content most of the time but do have memories of suffering. Assuming those memories are real, and your suffering is too, I’m still not sure that justifies calling the simulators “cruel”. The price may well be worth paying, if it potentially helps to avert some greater disaster in the base universe or other simulations, caused by insufficient philosophical understanding, moral blind spots, etc., and there is no better alternative.
Yes, I agree that you can’t give too much weight to my saying I’m in pain because I could be non-conscious from your viewpoint. Assuming all humans are conscious and pain is as it appears to be, there seems to be a lot of unnecessary pain, but yes I could be missing the value of having us experience it.
I’m often in low level chronic pain. Mine isn’t probably as bad as yours, so my life is clearly still net.positive (if you believe that positive emotions can outweigh suffering, which I do). Are you net negative do you think?
Sorry you’re in pain!