I seem to have accidentally caused quite a shitstorm overnight, so I want to make it extremely clear that SUPERVILLAIN STUFF IS NOT TO BE TAKEN AT FACE VALUE. IT IS A COMEDIC EXAGGERATION OF MY ACTUAL BELIEFS FOR THE SAKE OF A FICTIONAL PERSONA AIMED TO SIMULTANEOUSLY IMFORM AND AMUSE THOSE PEOPLE WHO AREN’T DISTRESSED BY SUCH THINGS. I apologize for the confusion.
So what are my actual beliefs on the matter? I do think that various interesting ways of deviating from the norm are less common presently than I’d like to see. I do not endorse exposing people to hormonal medications against their informed consent. If given the choice between two possible people, I would prioritize the one which is more different from other people unless there is substantial incompatibility in terminal values etc.
I consider this a natural consequence of a computationalist model of identity. If one runs a bit-perfect copy of me, the world gains no extra value at all. If one runs an otherwise perfect copy of me with just a few small changes, the world gains very little extra value because there is no magical limit where persons turn discrete. Thus given a fixed amount of instances of persons, value is maximized by having them be spread across as wide an area of mutually-compatible-person-space as possible. Furthermore, adding a new source of diversity not only introduces such people to the universe, but also introduces other people to such people as well, making their experiences more different from experiences previously had. Also, if diversity has value, enough diversity outweighs some quality of life, and other such concerns, further matching my moral intuitions that creating an autistic person who posts about strange things on tumblr is as okay as creating a neurotypical person, but creating a person suffering from extreme depression is less desirable than creating a less suffering person.
The expression “magical gender creatures” was a reference to a comment on Yud’s facebook post on the suspected “20% rate of women”, on the observed massive gender diversity in the region. No implications about trans people being inherently magical or whatever intended. The part about clones was intended in a more literal fashion: it would be a dramatic loss of value if people converged on the most normative pattern even if it did increase hedons. I can see how the context wasn’t optimally expressed and could be taken as judgement of the readers’ life choices and I’m sorry for not being more careful to make it clear enough in the first place so such things could’ve been avoided.
If given the choice between two possible people, I would prioritize the one which is more different from other people unless there is substantial incompatibility in terminal values etc.
If you don’t mind me poking at this a bit, a few questions:
I assume that, given the chance to save, from whatever contrived thought-experiment fate you like, either a pair of identical twins or one of the twins and a third, unrelated person, you would pick the second option. How far does this preference extend? Would your answer be any different if the twins had radically different life experiences? If the third person was different from the twins in a way you found personally unappealing, but not morally wrong? If the third person could be considered to have a lower quality of life?
That’s the region where things become complicated. On difference alone the unrelated person would be tie-breaker, assuming they also have an equally close person who would suffer from their death as much as the living twin. On the other hand identical twins are rare and thus would get priority even if they resemble each other a bit more. And it’s not very strong on this level because people are individually different from each other; the aggregate of thousands to millions of experiences is where I start considering such things relevant.
Personally unappealing shouldn’t matter as long as they don’t impose their unappealingness upon others because I prefer people to be operating on a meta-rule that we don’t discriminate on that. But if they do materially impose their values on others I get uncomfortable because on one hand the meta-rule of no discrimination on political beliefs, on the other hand the world needs more people who stick to their own business and less people who coercively restrict bodily autonomy etc.
Getting to less vague territory this suggests I should value a neo-nazi who doesn’t vote, do political advocacy, or have kids, over a moderate who similarly abstains from them, and it feels really weird but is also a bullet I’m perfectly willing to bite.
I don’t want to be the judge of people’s quality of life and whether theirs is worth living (I know mine would fairly be considered lower than that of many, but it also feels eudaimonic in a way that kind of resembles Dark Souls; I may not be in bliss as much as many others but I feel much more alive than I think I would in a more conventionally happy and easy life), so I’d go on the priors of what I know about their preferences and err on the side of equality.
This kind of ethics is really hard and very least-convenient-worldy. In practice my value for diversity mostly manifests in very enthusiastically defending people’s independence from normativities, morphological freedom, consensualism, and advocating for the awesomeness of abnormal existence, and the sort of libertarianism which is basically “don’t hurt others, and we really should make sure everyone has the basic things they need and there are no obscene hierarchies where I throw more money on what’s basically a toy than millions can afford to spend in an entire year, and we need to figure out the problem with kids, but other than that feel free to be as disgusting as you want as long as I can opt out from being subjected to it (yes, I tentatively support LGBTQ- or immigrant- or judaism- or islam-free small communities as long as they don’t begin to dominate society and the problem with innocent children born into them is sorted out)”. I don’t get distressed over the existence of people with such kinks as long as they only do it with other consenting adults and don’t form conspiracies that begin monopolizing opportunities. All I ask for return is that I get to do the same; I can even agree to credible mechanisms for ensuring my freaky transhumanism genuinely doesn’t threaten their continued existence. Diversity isn’t a one-way street and having some consensually traditional conformist people is good as long as we can mutually honor each other’s desire to not be assimilated.
3 months ago · tagged #vulgar libertarianism #the best heuristic for oppressed people since sharp stick time #death cw #nazis cw · 12 notes · source: socialjusticemunchkin · .permalink
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socialjusticemunchkin reblogged this from rusalkii and added:That’s the region where things become complicated. On difference alone the unrelated person would be tie-breaker,...
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ghostofasecretary liked this- rusalkii reblogged this from socialjusticemunchkin and added:
If you don’t mind me poking at this a bit, a few questions:I assume that, given the chance to save, from whatever...