It sounds like extra work, and I’m not sure there would be a payoff. Presumably a past person whose volition was coherently extrapolated would lose their racism and other backwards attitudes, and thus be on par with a contemporary person’s coherently extrapolated volition. With future persons, the argument could be made that their CEV can’t be much different from a current person’s for similar reasons.
Presumably a past person whose volition was coherently extrapolated would lose their racism and other backwards attitudes, and thus be on par with a contemporary person’s coherently extrapolated volition.
Even if we grant this assumption, this sort of argument clearly cannot be generalized to justify the exclusion of nonhuman animals—who have preferences that humans routinely disregard—from the class of beings whose volitions are to be coherently extrapolated. Why not run CEV on all present sentient beings?
It sounds like extra work, and I’m not sure there would be a payoff. Presumably a past person whose volition was coherently extrapolated would lose their racism and other backwards attitudes, and thus be on par with a contemporary person’s coherently extrapolated volition. With future persons, the argument could be made that their CEV can’t be much different from a current person’s for similar reasons.
That’s a lot to presume. Gwern lists some reasons from history to think this statement is unlikely to be true.
Even if we grant this assumption, this sort of argument clearly cannot be generalized to justify the exclusion of nonhuman animals—who have preferences that humans routinely disregard—from the class of beings whose volitions are to be coherently extrapolated. Why not run CEV on all present sentient beings?