It seems that our intuitions about whether to add or average utilities between individuals depend on the “distance” between the individuals under consideration. The “farther apart” they are (from spatially nearby in the same quantum branch, to far apart in the same branch, to different branches, to different universes), the more our intuitions tend toward adding instead of averaging.
Clearly, our intuition of identical copy immortality does not extend fully to quantum branches, and even less to other possible worlds, but we don’t seem to have a theory of why that should be the case.
“Identical copy immortality” in retrospect is just a case of the averaging intuition. What to do about this situation? It seems to me there are at least three plausible resolutions we might end up with:
We eventually come up with some sort of satisfactory explanation for when we should average, and when we should aggregate.
Different people find different explanations satisfactory, and we split into various averagist and aggregationist camps.
We accept these varying intuitions as essentially arbitrary, just part of the morality that evolution “gifted” us with.
It seems that our intuitions about whether to add or average utilities between individuals depend on the “distance” between the individuals under consideration. The “farther apart” they are (from spatially nearby in the same quantum branch, to far apart in the same branch, to different branches, to different universes), the more our intuitions tend toward adding instead of averaging.
My post The Moral Status of Independent Identical Copies raised this issue:
“Identical copy immortality” in retrospect is just a case of the averaging intuition. What to do about this situation? It seems to me there are at least three plausible resolutions we might end up with:
We eventually come up with some sort of satisfactory explanation for when we should average, and when we should aggregate.
Different people find different explanations satisfactory, and we split into various averagist and aggregationist camps.
We accept these varying intuitions as essentially arbitrary, just part of the morality that evolution “gifted” us with.