> If some people want to choose not to be converted into hedonium, and they’re not hurting anybody else by so choosing, why not let them have their way? It’s their free choice, after all!
They’re hurting all the potential people who could be created from the atoms that make them up. And if all else fails, they’re hurting their future selves. For practical purposes, it’s useful to treat your future self like an extension of you, much like with property. But fundamentally, it’s a different being that exists in a different time. Letting everyone have their own free choice is something that’s generally good for practical purposes, like property, but that doesn’t make it the be all and end all. If someone freely decided to sell their soul to the devil for a pop tart, that would be bad and I would want to stop them.
> If some people want to choose not to be converted into hedonium, and they’re not hurting anybody else by so choosing, why not let them have their way? It’s their free choice, after all!
They’re hurting all the potential people who could be created from the atoms that make them up. And if all else fails, they’re hurting their future selves. For practical purposes, it’s useful to treat your future self like an extension of you, much like with property. But fundamentally, it’s a different being that exists in a different time. Letting everyone have their own free choice is something that’s generally good for practical purposes, like property, but that doesn’t make it the be all and end all. If someone freely decided to sell their soul to the devil for a pop tart, that would be bad and I would want to stop them.