I think all the stories and adventures and loves and lives that people in the world have lived are worth quite a lot of torture, and it’s not naively the case that if the torturous experiences are larger than the other experiences, that this means they’re more important.
For you, is this a quantitative question, or an “in principle” question? Like could there exist some amount of extreme suffering, for which you would judge them to be outweighing the meaningful and worthwhile experiences?
Or is the sentiment more like “if there exists a single moment of meaning, that redeems all the pain and suffering of all of history”?
Scope sensitivity: Some amount of it should be able to outweigh a certain amount of meaning.
Virtue ethics: I am willing to push through a lot of suffering if it means something; the simple ratio of the two does not determine whether the overall thing is worthwhile.
Deontology: it does kind of differ on whether you’re responsible for the suffering happening or not.
It’s also plausible to me that I am more coming at this from a deontological feeling of “One should not kill everyone if one has a good reason” rather than “The world is net positive”.
It’s also plausible to me that I am more coming at this from a deontological feeling of “One should not kill everyone if one has a good reason” rather than “The world is net positive”.
I agree that these are importantly different, and easily conflated!
For you, is this a quantitative question, or an “in principle” question? Like could there exist some amount of extreme suffering, for which you would judge them to be outweighing the meaningful and worthwhile experiences?
Or is the sentiment more like “if there exists a single moment of meaning, that redeems all the pain and suffering of all of history”?
I don’t know. Some frames:
Scope sensitivity: Some amount of it should be able to outweigh a certain amount of meaning.
Virtue ethics: I am willing to push through a lot of suffering if it means something; the simple ratio of the two does not determine whether the overall thing is worthwhile.
Deontology: it does kind of differ on whether you’re responsible for the suffering happening or not.
It’s also plausible to me that I am more coming at this from a deontological feeling of “One should not kill everyone if one has a good reason” rather than “The world is net positive”.
I agree that these are importantly different, and easily conflated!