07-02-2004 04:08									#181
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel Well, it's caused by the silliness of the woman. It's her complete disagreement to reproduce that has left me with no choice. Oh, and that "1/11th of humanity" is a worthless argument.

The thing is, its her choice to make. After all, in no species is a female bound to procriate with males whose genes she might not care to propegate.

quote: we lost? we are done? we lost to whom? and what's the point of giving up? what do you think you'll get? a consolation prize? This is esp. silly if you consider there IS a chance left. might as well make the best of it.

A miniscule chance ( I mean trully miniscule) built upon the back of violence. Sorry, but trying for a 1 in a trillion chance of a slight outcome (becuase at best, all you get is a few more women to turn into breeders, to try yet agains for what is now a 1 in a billion chance, then in another generation maybe a one in a million chance...) vs what you know to be certain suffering.

Honestly, were is the utalitarian sense in that? a 100% chance of misery for a .00000000000000001 chance of less misery next geenration, so forth?

	07-02-2004 04:08									#182
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quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat BTW, thanks for the condolences and good wishes, everyone.

no problem

	07-02-2004 04:11									#183
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel quote: But on its own it seems absurd that we should be required to propagate at all. Why is that? 'cept the fact that you don't want to?

Because it is one thing to say that we have obligations to creatures that we do bring into being, or am likely to bring into being; but something else to say that I have an obligation to bring beings into being.

The former accounts for our intuition that we must take the interests of future generations into account - so the latter is not required to explain it. So if you want an argument why we have to propagate, appealing to the interests of merely possible people isn't going to work.

You asked why we should take the interests of future generations into account. I've given you an answer. As to why we should be required to propagate, I don't know. I can't think of a reason why, although it makes me laugh to think of poor Boris being forced to mount some buxom young lass to fulfil his moral duty.

	07-02-2004 04:13									#184
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quote: Originally posted by Theben Enslaving? Raping? Destruction of family? You're taking a leap of faith here.

Given the historical treatment of females of the species and their status, it's a leap of faith to assume anything benign would happen to them. Rather, it's a leap of faith on your part (or a belief in the ability of a coercive male-dominated program of "education" to "mold" the girl's will to become breeding stock) that the baby / girl / eventual woman would want to simply crank out kids nonstop as long as she has the physical capacity to do so. What if she likes one guy, who happens to be a sensitive, caring guy with crappy genes, alone among us real he-men, and she decides when she feels like she's old enough, she wants to have a kid or two just with him? Sorry - once you bleed, you breed, and nobody asked your opinion, *****, the survival of the species is at stake here. The woman is not enslaved and not raped only if her desire coincidentally happens to be to serve as a baby factory for whoever is selected to breed with her. Assuming that result is a leap of faith.

quote: The women I highly doubt would be enslaved, any more so than any other person in the community, just trying to survive.

There is a huge difference between an individual trying to survive on her own terms, and being "obligated" to breed en masse to perpetuate the species, or a family line, or a tribe or clan.

quote: Most probable that they will be conferred with an exceptionally high status in the community, if not made the leaders.

Why bother? They're going to do what the majority of males want, or they're going to die in the process. Why any pretense? And it's hard to be the leader when you're flat on your back from puberty til menopause.

quote: The breeding need not be forced (except the 1st woman) and it is just as likely if not more likely that the women will accept the responsibility and status given to them.

Pregnancy is difficult, childbirth painful - why do you assume a girl will want to grow up to crank out kids from the moment she's able to do so until the moment she's no longer able to do so, especially if the fate of the girls she would bear is more of the same, and and boys shoe would bare are non-essential. (and likely to be killed off when young and weak, so that when they're in their prime, they don't displace the existing power structure in the original survivors.

quote: And the familial concept would only change from nuclear/extended to communal, which already exists and isn't a bad one. It's found in many 'primitive' societies and that's what this would be.

A communal family system still considers the needs and desires of the individuals within it.

quote: As for the males who've lost "breeding opportunities", well, in your scenario they lost them anyway, right?

It's not the same - in my scenario, everyone lives out their remaining lives as best they can. In the other scenario, one group appoints itself the "select" and reserves breeding opportunities to itself, and the other group can go jerk off in the bushes. Or fight.

	07-02-2004 04:14									#185
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quote: The thing is, its her choice to make. After all, in no species is a female bound to procriate with males whose genes she might not care to propegate.

bloody irrelevant, since it's quite obvious that it's not the procreation of the species that's on her mind. It's the thing that differentiates us from regular animals. But that doesn't mean that we aren't animals as well, and that continuation of the species isn't an important goal.

quote: A miniscule chance ( I mean trully miniscule) built upon the back of violence.

The violence against this woman is completely negligble in comparison to the immense importance of the task.

quote: Sorry, but trying for a 1 in a trillion chance of a slight outcome (becuase at best, all you get is a few more women to turn into breeders, to try yet agains for what is now a 1 in a billion chance, then in another generation maybe a one in a million chance...) vs what you know to be certain suffering.

It's not a one in a trillion chance. The odds are way better. It will be much better after the first 10 generations or so.

quote: Honestly, were is the utalitarian sense in that? a 100% chance of misery for a .00000000000000001 chance of less misery next geenration, so forth?

Well, the next generation will be much less miserable. Unless you claim that the lives of countless generations of early evolution and pre-evolution people have lived their lives in vain.

	07-02-2004 04:18									#186
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel Oh, and another thing, Boris: quote: How is this relevant? Is there any need in the here-and-now to set a bomb with a time trigger for 100 years later? Will it somehow alleviate suffering today to plant a bomb like that? What a ludicrous scenario. That's not ludicrous. That's the point. It's a BAD thing to do. but is it immoral to this now to people who aren't born yet?

Actually, it is ludicrous, because you're comparing two drastically different futures.

In this world, we assume there will be lots of people in future generations, because there are lots of people who now, happily and voluntarily, crank out lots of babies. And we figure there's enough babies to go around so that when they grow up, enough of them will want to crank out more babies, so that we have no problem in assuming that there will be many people in those future generations.

In the scenario given - there is no assumption that there will be any "future generations" at all, unless we take action to force an attempt to create those future generations.

	07-02-2004 04:25									#187
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quote: Because it is one thing to say that we have obligations to creatures that we do bring into being, or am likely to bring into being; but something else to say that I have an obligation to bring beings into being. The former accounts for our intuition that we must take the interests of future generations into account - so the latter is not required to explain it. So if you want an argument why we have to propagate, appealing to the interests of merely possible people isn't going to work.

That's not so simple. Why do you have an obligation for the future generations? as with all ethics, due to reasons of utility/welfare/whatever.

Not having that future generation means that this utility will not be there, that means less utility that means less ethical.

	07-02-2004 04:25									#188
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quote: That's why family planning is extremely ethical ; it allows for a reasonable number of people in the next generation,

So who determines what counts as reasonable? I would argue that the only ones qualified to set the standard would be the parents themselves. Otherwise, you get into forced sterilizations and abortions as we have right now in China in order to enforce a one-child policy.

	07-02-2004 04:29									#189
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quote: So who determines what counts as reasonable? I would argue that the only ones qualified to set the standard would be the parents themselves. Otherwise, you get into forced sterilizations and abortions as we have right now in China in order to enforce a one-child policy

Or, you can have a wiser method of enforcing this through financial insentives. The parents themselves are certainly NOT the only ones qualified for this. Some ( stupid) parents think that it's a good idea to have 11 kids, let me share a secret with you: IT'S NOT.

	07-02-2004 04:31									#190
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quote: In this world, we assume there will be lots of people in future generations, because there are lots of people who now, happily and voluntarily, crank out lots of babies. And we figure there's enough babies to go around so that when they grow up, enough of them will want to crank out more babies, so that we have no problem in assuming that there will be many people in those future generations. In the scenario given - there is no assumption that there will be any "future generations" at all, unless we take action to force an attempt to create those future generations.

That's the whole goddamn debate:

Does the next generation have a right to exist? of course not. Rights do not exist. Would it be WRONG to prevent from the next generation to exist: yes, of course. Would it be right to create such a next generation: Yes, obviouisly.

	07-02-2004 04:35									#191
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quote: I don't think you can move from saying that we have moral obligations towards likely future existents, to a position that says we must propagate in order to ensure their existence. That would lead to an absurd view in which we were obliged to have as many children as we could in order to maximize the welfare of future generations (there being more of them to be happy).

First off, maximising welfare, is just another flavour of utilitarianism, afflicted by the same problems associated with other forms of utilitarianism.

Secondly, I think that all duties to future persons can be better expressed as duties to persons. For example, not wanting to destroy the environment for your children.

Propagation is a funny thing. Usually, it is a non-issue because people who wanted to have sex would have kids, and who would want to do away with sex? It is only when you decouple sex from pregnancy, do you start to need further 'duties' and justifications to ensure the propagation of man.

	07-02-2004 04:36									#192
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel bloody irrelevant, since it's quite obvious that it's not the procreation of the species that's on her mind. It's the thing that differentiates us from regular animals. But that doesn't mean that we aren't animals as well, and that continuation of the species isn't an important goal.

Actually, the ability to conceptualize is what separates us, meaning man has, unlike any other naimals, the ability to imagine a world without himself as individual, or species, and perhaps even choose such an ending. Yes, we have a innate drive to spread our genes, but that is it, only OURS- the notion of spreading the species as well, that is a conception of MAN, not an inbuilt drive- other individuals of any other species could not give a crap about "the species", since they can;t even conceptulize that.

quote: negligble in comparison to the immense importance of the task.

What importance? There is no importance to mankind surviving, anymore than there is any importance to mankind ending. Certainly in your mind it is critical, but not a universal notion, not when we get to this situation.

quote: It's not a one in a trillion chance. The odds are way better. It will be much better after the first 10 generations or so.

The odds are stagerring: first, you may have a series of problems that make the woman less than fertile-for example, the simplest one-she happens to be 35 or so, near the end of her viable reproductive life...
The porblems with the males and thier reproductive fitness
Problems in childbirthing and rearing
An newly inhospitable environment perhaps
Lack of food and dangers of accidents

It is beyond me how any event that could lead to 99.9999% annahilation of any species would leave a situation hospitable for the rest. Do you honestly think that when those great mass extinctions occured every sinlge member of those species got hit? And yet, they didn;t make it back- half a billion years of vertebrate life shows that if you get to a point were 99.9999% die off, honestly there is NO coming back

quote: Well, the next generation will be much less miserable. Unless you claim that the lives of countless generations of early evolution and pre-evolution people have lived their lives in vain.

Why will they be much less miserable? lets say this woman is raped repeatedly andf finally produces a female (accepting that baby boys born would have to have been killed of). Now, the womna can no longer have any babies- so she raises a daughter in the full knowledge that once she gets to 13 years of age, the rapes will start -unless somehow the girl luckily fell in love with someone-hopefully for genetic diversity not her father. And then this one girl, unlike her mother who at least had some years in her life of not being a breeder, will spend the rest of her life (if it lasts long) as a breeder herself...yeah, much less suffering for the next generation....

	07-02-2004 04:38									#193
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quote: First off, maximising welfare, is just another flavour of utilitarianism, afflicted by the same problems associated with other forms of utilitarianism.

want to challenge utilitarianism? open a new thread.

	07-02-2004 04:39									#194
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quote: The parents themselves are certainly NOT the only ones qualified for this. Some ( stupid) parents think that it's a good idea to have 11 kids, let me share a secret with you: IT'S NOT.

Supposing you met Bill Gates. Would you tell him not to have 11 children? Why or why not?

	07-02-2004 04:39									#195
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quote: Originally posted by Ben Kenobi Supposing you met Bill Gates. Would you tell him not to have 11 children? Why or why not?

I'd tell him to adopt 11 children.

	07-02-2004 04:43									#196
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel That's not so simple. Why do you have an obligation for the future generations? as with all ethics, due to reasons of utility/welfare/whatever.

Because we bring them into existence. Why are you responsible for the welfare of your children? Because you had them. If we chose not to have children that would not be immoral.

quote: Not having that future generation means that this utility will not be there, that means less utility that means less ethical.

But that requires us to accept the whole utilitarian package, which I don't. Why must we worry about welfare per se, rather than the welfare of those who do or are likely to exist?

	07-02-2004 04:45									#197
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quote: Originally posted by Ben Kenobi Supposing you met Bill Gates. Would you tell him not to have 11 children? Why or why not?

I would tell him no- it would make for very ugly squabbles over the leftovers of the fortune he leaves.

	07-02-2004 04:50									#198
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel That's the whole goddamn debate: Does the next generation have a right to exist? of course not. Rights do not exist.

Rights are fundamental. However, they sometimes need balls, a spine, a strong right arm and a steady aim to secure or enforce them.

quote: Would it be WRONG to prevent from the next generation to exist: yes, of course.

You're not preventing it from existing - they hypothetical phenomena that wiped out 99.99999998 of the population in a short period of time is what prevents the next generation's existence.

quote: Would it be right to create such a next generation: Yes, obviouisly.

Neither right nor obvious. The creation of a "next generation" (actually, just some individual offspring you hope will be numerous and healthy enough to eventually establish a next generation.) is morally neutral in and of itself. The individual conduct that results in the attempt to create that next generation is subject to moral interpretation, not the mere existence or non-existence of that "next generation."

	07-02-2004 04:51									#199
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quote: Actually, the ability to conceptualize is what separates us, meaning man has, unlike any other naimals, the ability to imagine a world without himself as individual, or species, and perhaps even choose such an ending. Yes, we have a innate drive to spread our genes, but that is it, only OURS- the notion of spreading the species as well, that is a conception of MAN, not an inbuilt drive- other individuals of any other species could not give a crap about "the species", since they can;t even conceptulize that.

You're obviously right, but that doesn't change my point.

quote: What importance? There is no importance to mankind surviving, anymore than there is any importance to mankind ending. Certainly in your mind it is critical, but not a universal notion, not when we get to this situation.

In that case, nothing is important. I am calling it important since a great ethical value is on the line.

quote: The odds are stagerring: first, you may have a series of problems that make the woman less than fertile-for example, the simplest one-she happens to be 35 or so, near the end of her viable reproductive life... The porblems with the males and thier reproductive fitness Problems in childbirthing and rearing An newly inhospitable environment perhaps Lack of food and dangers of accidents It is beyond me how any event that could lead to 99.9999% annahilation of any species would leave a situation hospitable for the rest. Do you honestly think that when those great mass extinctions occured every sinlge member of those species got hit? And yet, they didn;t make it back- half a billion years of vertebrate life shows that if you get to a point were 99.9999% die off, honestly there is NO coming back

I agree that this is a long shot but say it was the same conditions on a virgin earth, would you then change your mind? ( I still think that since we have nothing to lose, it's better to try ) The woman being 35, etc. are all possibilities, but if you're going for such a worst case scenario, might as well make them crippled below the neck, and the woman 89 years old.

quote: Why will they be much less miserable? lets say this woman is raped repeatedly andf finally produces a female (accepting that baby boys born would have to have been killed of). Now, the womna can no longer have any babies- so she raises a daughter in the full knowledge that once she gets to 13 years of age, the rapes will start -unless somehow the girl luckily fell in love with someone-hopefully for genetic diversity not her father.

Is all sex a result of love, or rape? And btw, 13 is too young, me thinks. The risks are too great.

quote: And then this one girl, unlike her mother who at least had some years in her life of not being a breeder, will spend the rest of her life (if it lasts long) as a breeder herself...yeah, much less suffering for the next generation....

a Breeder! god forbid that! She'll obviously suffer a lot all her life.
Look, I am not telling you that this is going to be easy, but I am telling you, it's better than just die.

quote: Supposing you met Bill Gates. Would you tell him not to have 11 children? Why or why not?

Well, in our society, I wouldn't mind him having a rather large number of kids, but not as much as 11, since that's the point the parent-child contact begins to be rather impersonal, I think. I'd also recommend a homeless guy not to have any kids.

HOWEVER, this doesn't mean that this would be the case in the ideal society. Ideally, the number of people per couple, or whatever social structure it will possess will be more equal, since the government will provide with help.


****. It's 01:50 here. Signing out here. G'night.

	07-02-2004 05:00									#200
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel In that case, nothing is important. I am calling it important since a great ethical value is on the line.

What ethical value? Survival is not an ethical value whatsoever.

quote: I agree that this is a long shot but say it was the same conditions on a virgin earth, would you then change your mind? ( I still think that since we have nothing to lose, it's better to try ) The woman being 35, etc. are all possibilities, but if you're going for such a worst case scenario, might as well make them crippled below the neck, and the woman 89 years old.

Nothing to lose? The guys raping perhaps- the woman being raped has a hell of a lot to loose- including possibly her life in childbirth. It is easy for the guys who bear NO RISK to talk about nothing to lose.

quote: all sex a result of love, or rape? And btw, 13 is too young, me thinks. The risks are too great.

To maximize survival chances, you have to start as soon as possible..you say the risks are too great? Sorry, not an option- either you start after she 'bled' the first time, or it is obvious you passion for restoring mankind is not there. Remember, about 50% of pregnancies will be boys, and we have to go 9 motnhs and then kill the buggers and then try again to get her pregnant until we get one more female- and then more and more and as many as possible within her window of opportunity.

quote: Look, I am not telling you that this is going to be easy, but I am telling you, it's better than just die.

Why? You will die, and the "inherent value" in the continuation of the species is a very fuszzy concept.

will wait for responses tommorrow.

	07-02-2004 05:07									#201
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quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat Rights are fundamental.

Uh... hardly.

What's the use of them? If you say that people will be worse off without them, then it is welfare which is fundamental.

If not, then rights have nothing to do with human well being, or they are quite magical.

If you say that they are mandated by God, then it's God's will that is fundamental (or God is not omnipotent, since he is subject to moral rules).

	07-02-2004 06:10									#202
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MtG - since you find the moral status of the society of our distant ancestors so unacceptable, do you believe that they should have behaved in a more restrained, less breeding-oriented fashion, thus possibly causing us in the modern day not to exist?

Now, a quick question for anyone - if you're a utilitarian (or a consequentialist, or something of that nature), and you get to choose or influence someone else's style of ethics (possibly by being responsible for their education), what should you choose?

A first thought is that you should encourage them to be utilitarian too, so that they will act in the same way that you do. But, what if they're not intelligent enough to extrapolate from their actions in the way that utilitarianism requires? In that case, you'd do better to inculcate in them a rights-based system of morals, which is at least a reasonable approximation to a utilitarian system in most situations.

	07-02-2004 06:24									#203
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quote: Originally posted by JellyBean MtG - since you find the moral status of the society of our distant ancestors so unacceptable, do you believe that they should have behaved in a more restrained, less breeding-oriented fashion, thus possibly causing us in the modern day not to exist?

We don't have near enough information in the archaeological record to establish at what point our distant ancestors developed sufficient mental capacity for self-awareness, and whatever other objective cognitive conditions are necessary to develop or believe in any particular moral framework.

The next problem is that we don't know how these population groups operated - in reality, new "species" as we currently define them were very gradual modifications from existing individuals, so presumably they were part of established breeding populations, and the more successful individuals were better at propagating. That's the general process. We don't know the details, and we can assume that a great many small isolated population groups died off, just as we have observed with larger population groups such as the Anasazi in the southwest US desert, or the pre-Shoshonean natives in southern California.

Regardless of their actions, their intent was not to act "for the benefit of the master race (er, um, species)" it was most likely for individual benefit and/or instinctive. It most certainly was not intended for our benefit, or the benefit of any abstract future group.

	07-02-2004 06:41									#204
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quote: Originally posted by Boris Godunov That isn't a reasonable assumption by any means. The amount of technology needed to keep a 6-month old premature baby alive far exceeds that needed for an abortion. For starters, there's the matter of electricity. Az: Again, you've not given any coherent reason why the survival of the human race is so important in this instance that it permits rape/murder. I'm assuming you don't approve of such things normally, so I'd like to get a consistent argument.

what about the amount needed to do a safe abortion where the mother will survive? France has some pretty interesting rules on what kind of equipment has to be on hand and ready to use whenever someone takes RU-486 for example.

	07-02-2004 06:55									#205
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quote: Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat Let's take this pleasant scenario even further. Let's say she has a female child and then dies. So you have one female, 12-13 years from puberty. You can raise that female, do everything possible to "protect" her since she's your only means of perpetuating the species, then systematically force breed her as often as she can physically take it. To assure the greatest possible genetic variation in your limited remaining gene pool (and we know this is critical to long term survival from studies of Kilimanjaro crater lions and great apes in isolated gene pools), you have to breed her around with the healthiest men with the best genetic profile. Some of her kids will be male, thus useless. Some may be female, depending on the odds, how long she survives as breeding stock, etc. With each female, you have another 12-13 year wait before they can be bred. So for two generations, you're looking at 25-30 years, assuming you don't get a run of boys. Many of your original surviving males will have died off by then, maybe most or all, depending on the conditions on earth and their age and health. Assuming everything goes your way, and all females born are fertile and survive until breeding age, you are attempting to reestablish a viable population based on essentially enslaving any females as breeding stock, raping them (by forced breeding with a variety of partners to gain the largest possible genetic diversity), and excluding some or many of the survinving males from any breeding opportunities. You've gone back to the cave days in terms of rights of females, you've destroyed any concept of familial relationships, and you have a limited population that is still critically inbred for many generations would be susceptible to many possible factors wiping out the "breeding stock." Is this combination of murder, rape, slavery, and the fundamental destruction of familiar relationships and moral concepts of rights and behavior worth it, in the vague hope of maintaining the species survival? Count me out. BTW, thanks for the condolences and good wishes, everyone.

In such a scenario we'll need your genetic diversity so we'll beat you up and force you to do it :P

Interbreeding doesn't become a problem for centuries, and given the fact that that there are many men(all of whom will not die off in the 25-30 year period, considering how long you can live if you take care of yourself) it might not be a problem at all.

Finally we are C-Sectioning the kid out at the last possible moment(unless someone could think of a reason for a 6 month pregnant woman to keel over because of the pregnancy right then and there).

	07-02-2004 06:57									#206
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quote: Originally posted by GePap What ethical value? Survival is not an ethical value whatsoever. quote: I agree that this is a long shot but say it was the same conditions on a virgin earth, would you then change your mind? ( I still think that since we have nothing to lose, it's better to try ) The woman being 35, etc. are all possibilities, but if you're going for such a worst case scenario, might as well make them crippled below the neck, and the woman 89 years old. Nothing to lose? The guys raping perhaps- the woman being raped has a hell of a lot to loose- including possibly her life in childbirth. It is easy for the guys who bear NO RISK to talk about nothing to lose. quote: all sex a result of love, or rape? And btw, 13 is too young, me thinks. The risks are too great. To maximize survival chances, you have to start as soon as possible..you say the risks are too great? Sorry, not an option- either you start after she 'bled' the first time, or it is obvious you passion for restoring mankind is not there. Remember, about 50% of pregnancies will be boys, and we have to go 9 motnhs and then kill the buggers and then try again to get her pregnant until we get one more female- and then more and more and as many as possible within her window of opportunity. quote: Look, I am not telling you that this is going to be easy, but I am telling you, it's better than just die. Why? You will die, and the "inherent value" in the continuation of the species is a very fuszzy concept. will wait for responses tommorrow.

why kill male offspring?

	07-02-2004 08:05									#207
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel A)It's permissable to rape/kill people, under VERY VERY special consequences. These are those VERY VERY rare, VERY dire consequences. Just like it's legal for the president to order to shoot down a plane full of civilians, if he knows it's about to crash into a skyscraper, for example.

What you consider dire circumstances is different than what many others might consider such. Indeed, the Nazis earnestly believed the "Jewish problem" was a very dire problem. They also earnestly believed that by wiping out Jews/gypsies/gays, they were doing an ultimate good for the service of humanity. That fits squarely within utilitarian values. So the philosophy is still conducive to genocide.

quote: B) This will actually be the case only if they'll accept utilitarian ethics. They might as well accept some other ethics, or develope a moral theory based on a deity, or whatever.

Utilitarian ethics can be used to justify any atrocity, as I've pointed out.

quote: No I am not, why would I be? Where's the utility in killing a billion people to mitigate a threat ( muslim extremist terrorism), that has killed only a very small number of people. And I am skipping the other "small" consequences: the depreciation of the value of human life by the public, the trauma, and the destruction of the soul for all of those people who will be executing this monstrosity, etc. etc.

:Hmmm:

You said "Killing a billion people to stop terrorism is completely uncomparable, ethically." This was as a comparison to Nazi atrocities, so you seemed to be arguing it was okay to kill a billion to stop terrorism.

quote: I've never claimed there is a right for those people to exist. I've said that their welfare and their happiness should be taken into consideration as well, just as the value of the people that exist today is taken into consideration. That's why we shouldn't destroy the enviroment ( a good example by agathon).

My turn:

If you are FORCING a woman to have a baby she doesn't want to have for the sole purpose of continuing the human race by your force of will, then how can you say you don't think there is a right for people to exist? You may not have stated such, but it's implicit in your very philosophy! Taking into account the welfare and happiness of future generations is NONSENSICAL when the question is whether or not there will even BE any future generations! You're not taking into account their welfare, you're forcing their existence. Citing Agathon as agreement is funny, because if you'd read him clearly, you'd see he disagrees with you and makes a clear delineation between such things as not destroying the environment and this scenario.

quote: How does that change the value of the non-existing people. In both cases they don't exist YET. in one of the cases, there certainty they'll exist is much lower than in the other, still there exists such possibility.

Um, easy: In this instance, their existence will solely be predicated by the forcible actions of you, the murderer/rapist. This is called rigging the system. Without your forceful actions, there is no question as to them existing: they won't.

Protecting the environment also, I should mention, doesn't involve rape/murder. So there's another big difference.

quote: Then the amount of utility will decrease. btw, I still claim that utility only applies to human beings, not to sentient beings, generally, since only human beings have a concept of ethics.

First, you've not demonstrated why "utility" is in and of itself something so precious that it must preserved by these lengths. Second, you've no evidence that the universe isn't vastly populated by ethical beings, nor that there aren't ethics in other earth beings. Any biologist who has made extensive studies of primate cultures would disagree with you, in that many primate species certainly do have ethics. As I've said, there's absolutely no reason to believe that should humanity go, other ethical, intelligent beings won't take our place. Evolution fills niches, and there is obviously a niche for such being on this planet.

quote: The limits aren't absurd. If you prefer the here-and-now, you're short-sighted, and are wrong. If you base your arguement on the uncertainty that these people will be born, then, as I've explained, nothing is certain.

The limits are absurd, but they follow logically from your arguments. You're concerned with the utility in the universe 500 years from now. Well, 15 billion years from now there won't be much of anything to worry about regardless. So what's the difference if humanity dies out today or in 10,000 years? What's the point of placing such primacy on purely thinking about the future without any regard to the here-and-now situation and suffering? Frankly, if being more concerned with real people than non-existent one is "short-sited," I don't have one bit of regret about being labeled such. Of course, I do care about the future and would like to make a future world that's as nice as possible for as many people as possible. I'm just not going to rape/murder to see it done.

But your logic reminds me of the people who scoff at animal rights activists by saying that if it weren't for humans breeding chickens/cows/pigs so they could eat them, then they might be extinct. As if it were better for a chicken to live and be slaughtered for a dinner than to never have lived at all. It's a truly bizarre line of thinking.

quote: Because Utility will encrease: more humans that are more happy for more time is good.

Increased utility for here-and-now people, yes. But to cause suffering to those people on a thin promise of it increasing for the future generations that would otherwise not even be created is an abhorently immoral position, and is fundamentally undercut by the premise that the increase of utility should be ensured for those certain/likely to be there, not for those who otherwise wouldn't be there except for your forcible actions to increase their utility. It's a strangely circular logic you have.

quote: problem is for most people, utility is still positive. The number of people who are better off dead is very small: the extremely sick individuals who want euthanasia come to mind. This is true even for the poorest countries. Did you know that 30% of all Indians consider themselves COMPLETELY satisfied with their lives?

The last anecdote is irrelevant, but I'll at least address the first part: We live in a pecular time of history where one could argue this is true. But it hasn't always been that way, and I'd argue that for most of human history, life has been more grim despair than happiness. The vast majority of people in history have lived in times of horrific wars and atrocities, devastating plagues and disasters, and great oppression. You're applying your narrow experiences and the snapshot of the modern world to all of history, which isn't particularly accurate.

But regardless, you don't know for sure...it could be that more people will ultimately suffer horribly than will benefit from your rape/murder.

Of course, given mankind's penchant for genocide, I'd also have to wonder if our destruction wouldn't ultimately be of utilitarian value to other intelligent lifeforms. Perhaps in our extinction is the prevention of our spreading massive genocide to other worlds, or of our race being a victim of such?

	07-02-2004 08:12									#208
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel Or, you can have a wiser method of enforcing this through financial insentives. The parents themselves are certainly NOT the only ones qualified for this. Some ( stupid) parents think that it's a good idea to have 11 kids, let me share a secret with you: IT'S NOT.

Patently stupid generalization.

I work with a guy who is the oldest of 14 kids. He and all of his siblings had a loving upbringing, are all pretty well-adjusted people and have loving families of their own. Their mother recently died, and the entire family (which was around 40 people, including all grandkids) assembled for the services, and it was (I was told) an incredible, uplifting celebration of thier mother and family.

Was utility increased?

	07-02-2004 08:16									#209
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quote: Originally posted by Azazel Does the next generation have a right to exist? of course not. Rights do not exist. Would it be WRONG to prevent from the next generation to exist: yes, of course.

Again, this is contradictory. If you believe it's wrong to "prevent the next generation from existing," you're de facto claiming they have some sort of right to exist. Your entire argument has been about forcing a woman to bring said generation into existence, against her will and at the expense of her life, just so those future people can exist and, as you put it, "increase utility." That IS saying they have some sort of "right" to exist, whether you're unwilling to explicitly state it or not.

	07-02-2004 15:42									#210
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Some damn good debates here people!

And that was exactly the objective of this thread!