This whole discussion seems to hinge on the possibly misleading choice of the word “torture” in the original thought-experiment. Words can be wrong and one way is to sneak in connotations and misleading vividness — and I think that’s what’s going on here.
In our world, torture implies a torturer, but dust specks do not imply a sandman. “Torture” refers chiefly to great suffering inflicted on a victim intentionally by some person, as a continuous voluntary act on the torturer’s part, and usually to serve some claimed social or moral purpose — often political or military today, but in the past frequently juridical or religious.
In the ordinary usage of the word “torture”, you as a human can’t torture someone you’ve never met; if you’re torturing someone, you know you’re doing it, and you probably have what feels to you like a good reason for it; and if you are being tortured, there is some human aware of the fact that they are torturing you, and continuously choosing to do so. All of these facts are morally relevant; they involve the ongoing choices of an agent. (As the “Omelas” story involves the ongoing complicity of an entire city of agents.)
Torture is personal. Dust specks aren’t; they come in on the wind at random. We have, I suspect, good reasons to be vastly more concerned over the doings of agents than the doings of wind, since agents may go around optimizing things to their liking, and the wind does not. And that’s what I think is going on here: it’s not that 3^^^3 is a big number; it’s that a torturer is an agent and the wind (exemplary deliverer of dust specks) is not.
This whole discussion seems to hinge on the possibly misleading choice of the word “torture” in the original thought-experiment. Words can be wrong and one way is to sneak in connotations and misleading vividness — and I think that’s what’s going on here.
The point is that a choice between the two is made. How the choice is instantiated is entirely irrelevant, saving that it be done in equivalent manners. (I.e.; if torture → torturer, then speck → specker && if torture !-> torturer; then speck !-> specker)
And that’s what I think is going on here: it’s not that 3^^^3 is a big number; it’s that a torturer is an agent and the wind (exemplary deliverer of dust specks) is not.
That would invalidate equivalency between the two options, however. We needn’t go that far. As I originally said; if the question is meant merely to derive whether a person views suffering to operate linearly for quantification purposes, as opposed to logarithmically, then restricting the topic to immediate suffering is sensible. However, the question was not phrased in that manner: it was instead asked to derive which of the two options is preferable to a consequentialistic utilitarian. And my argument simply put was that a culture that permits such tortures to occur—either at the hand of an agent or otherwise—faces significantly greater secondary consequences than are associated with 3^^^3 dust-speckings. Not the least of which is the ancillary suffering experienced by those cognizant of the suffering who can do nothing to prevent it; and the resulting increases in suffering in general caused by the presence of at least one individual suffering to that extremity—or, rather, caused by the innurement to human suffering engendered in a non-zero percentage of individuals aware of that suffering. And then there’s the question of self-determination; the tortured individual is bereft of all ability to achieve individual utility—all forms of utility, whereas the 3^^^3 speckees recieve only a barely noticeable disutility of displeasure and are otherwise almost entirely unaffected. (It’s possible a non-zero portion of those individuals might have accidents or the like, but given how infrequently getting a dust-speck in your eye causes traffic accidents—as in, I can find no record of such an incident—that’s negligible.)
I hope this clears up any confusion here as to the nature of my argument.
This whole discussion seems to hinge on the possibly misleading choice of the word “torture” in the original thought-experiment. Words can be wrong and one way is to sneak in connotations and misleading vividness — and I think that’s what’s going on here.
In our world, torture implies a torturer, but dust specks do not imply a sandman. “Torture” refers chiefly to great suffering inflicted on a victim intentionally by some person, as a continuous voluntary act on the torturer’s part, and usually to serve some claimed social or moral purpose — often political or military today, but in the past frequently juridical or religious.
In the ordinary usage of the word “torture”, you as a human can’t torture someone you’ve never met; if you’re torturing someone, you know you’re doing it, and you probably have what feels to you like a good reason for it; and if you are being tortured, there is some human aware of the fact that they are torturing you, and continuously choosing to do so. All of these facts are morally relevant; they involve the ongoing choices of an agent. (As the “Omelas” story involves the ongoing complicity of an entire city of agents.)
Torture is personal. Dust specks aren’t; they come in on the wind at random. We have, I suspect, good reasons to be vastly more concerned over the doings of agents than the doings of wind, since agents may go around optimizing things to their liking, and the wind does not. And that’s what I think is going on here: it’s not that 3^^^3 is a big number; it’s that a torturer is an agent and the wind (exemplary deliverer of dust specks) is not.
The point is that a choice between the two is made. How the choice is instantiated is entirely irrelevant, saving that it be done in equivalent manners. (I.e.; if torture → torturer, then speck → specker && if torture !-> torturer; then speck !-> specker)
That would invalidate equivalency between the two options, however. We needn’t go that far. As I originally said; if the question is meant merely to derive whether a person views suffering to operate linearly for quantification purposes, as opposed to logarithmically, then restricting the topic to immediate suffering is sensible. However, the question was not phrased in that manner: it was instead asked to derive which of the two options is preferable to a consequentialistic utilitarian. And my argument simply put was that a culture that permits such tortures to occur—either at the hand of an agent or otherwise—faces significantly greater secondary consequences than are associated with 3^^^3 dust-speckings. Not the least of which is the ancillary suffering experienced by those cognizant of the suffering who can do nothing to prevent it; and the resulting increases in suffering in general caused by the presence of at least one individual suffering to that extremity—or, rather, caused by the innurement to human suffering engendered in a non-zero percentage of individuals aware of that suffering. And then there’s the question of self-determination; the tortured individual is bereft of all ability to achieve individual utility—all forms of utility, whereas the 3^^^3 speckees recieve only a barely noticeable disutility of displeasure and are otherwise almost entirely unaffected. (It’s possible a non-zero portion of those individuals might have accidents or the like, but given how infrequently getting a dust-speck in your eye causes traffic accidents—as in, I can find no record of such an incident—that’s negligible.)
I hope this clears up any confusion here as to the nature of my argument.