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Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

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Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#111
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, but he’s said stuff like this before and nobody twisted his arm.

> I’m disappointed he projects some sort of idealised aloof moral superiority on anything non human I see no evidence in the podcast transcript of Singer making such a claim. What exactly are you basing your assertion on? Quote the transcript please.

He thinks dolphins would ask “ Why have you failed? Why have you failed to stop humans treating animals so badly?”

Dolphins are violent murderous rapey predators. What on Earth makes anyone think an intelligent dolphin would give a crap how humans treat animals in general? They’d be just as likely to try and make a deal with us to help us out with marine research, in exchange for helping them to genocide the males in another dolphin group so they can gang rape the females.

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question isn’t if 2 year olds are intelligent it’s if dogs are of comparable intelligence to a human 2 year old. They are. > As for language, the average dog can learn 165 words, including signals, and the "super dogs" (those in the top 20 percent of dog intelligence) can learn 250 words, Coren says. "The upper limit of dogs' ability to learn language is partly based on a study of a border collie named Rico who s…

I have been replying to OP who literally said: > A 23 months old human is generally less intelligent than a dog and has a consciousness vastly different from us. If the lives of people (and everyone else) got better from killing such a being, then why not? So what is your point? Is today "rationalist edgeloard"-day?

[dead]

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#113
post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have been replying to OP who literally said: > A 23 months old human is generally less intelligent than a dog and has a consciousness vastly different from us. If the lives of people (and everyone else) got better from killing such a being, then why not? So what is your point? Is today "rationalist edgeloard"-day?

[dead]

In fact, I do acknowledge that many things we do to animals are horrific. But this is just whataboutism.

So you are really telling me that you are ok with killing little kids for "utilitarian good" (whatever that is)?

You still haven't answered my question: do you have any real-life experience with little kids? I am pretty sure you haven't, otherwise you wouldn't spew such obvious bullshit.

Now let's remember what you said in your original post:

> Why not take infanticide seriously? A 23 months old human is generally less intelligent than a dog and has a consciousness vastly different from us.

Honestly, that's one of the most fucked up things I have ever read on HN. Congratulations!

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#114
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’m disappointed he projects some sort of idealised aloof moral superiority on anything non human I see no evidence in the podcast transcript of Singer making such a claim. What exactly are you basing your assertion on? Quote the transcript please.

He thinks dolphins would ask “ Why have you failed? Why have you failed to stop humans treating animals so badly?” Dolphins are violent murderous rapey predators. What on Earth makes anyone think an intelligent dolphin would give a crap how humans treat animals in general? They’d be just as likely to try and make a deal with us to help us out with marine research, in exchange for helping them to genocide the males in…

You quote part of a sentence about dolphins from the beginning of the transcript.

1. The context is Cowen posing a quirky, ice-breaker kind of question that entertain some counter-factual assumptions to get a conversation rolling. Not unusual in these kinds of pod conversations. The quirky setup and the laugh is evidence that strict realism about real world dolphins is not assumed by Singer and Cowen there. For example Cowen says "We explain to the dolphin that you’re Peter Singer, right?", but from Singer's other work it is clear that he doesn't think science into any dolphin so far has found cognitive capacity necessary to understand the concept of a well known academic moral philosopher who has written the kind of arguments Peter Singer is well known for. The best interpretation is that what is happening at the start of the conversation is merely a loose way to imagine and talk about an outside view on the harm humans do to other animals.

2. Setting 1 aside you ascribed a view about not just Dolphins but "anything non human" to Singer. What's your basis for that?

3. As for the "moral superiority" ascription, Singer imagining a dolphin asking him "Why have you failed to stop humans treating animals so badly?" doesn't imply that Singer thinks dolphins (in general, or that imagined kind) have "moral superiority". For one, real humans have already asked that question so the imaginary dolphin is at most on par, not superior, in asking it. Secondly a moral thinker (real human or imaginary dolphin) may be able to point out some moral problems or ask moral questions while at the same time be unable to refrain from harmful behaviour and unable to understand other moral problems, including those where they're themselves part of the problem. So nothing Singer says there implies that he thinks dolphins (real or imagined) are morally superior in the sense of never causing any harm or understanding all moral problems better than humans or anything like that.

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is about babies with life-threatening diseases that are being kept alive by medicine who have zero chance of leading any form of normal life. One chance was more than enough. I assume you're arguing in bad faith at this point.

> That is about babies with life-threatening diseases […] No, it is not. When he talks about "disabilities" he also means things like Downs syndrome.

He's not really getting into the topic of how we evaluate whether the life is worth living. He's just observing that sometimes, parents and doctors make the decision that a particular life is not worth living; then he makes a point about how such decisions should be carried out.

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought this was interesting and it didn't make me distrust him at all. I can't really tell why it should.

It's literally just the trolley problem, which is valuable and interesting only so far as it shows the limits and practical undecidability of thought experiments like this. Which, morally sophisticated people inevitably find is almost comically sensitive to details of the scenario or context, and that's it's virtually impossible to find a satisfying generalizable solution. And then singer is just like "no. u simply p…

It was interesting, sorry

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#117
post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

We need you to stop using HN for ideological flamewar. You've been doing it a lot, and breaking the site guidelines a lot in other ways too, such as by crossing into personal attack: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36247136 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36243998 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36243288 and failing to edit out swipes: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36195095 https://news.ycombina…

Got it. Dumb luck I saw this post, it was hidden. I didn't know anything was getting flagged. Didn't know how to see these messages.

I'd say it is 50/50, some of my posts were responses in-kind, and to me, some seem more like the other person was the one with the problem, and maybe flagging is itself an attack. Definitely some gray area in interpreting these. And, there are definitely some hot button topics that get flames going everywhere, and I got in the crossfire.

But, I did review the guidelines, and your history of past warnings to others. So know there is a 'two wrongs don't make a right' rule.

So, I'll watch it. I'd rather keep HN as it is than fight.

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Rules like “don’t murder people” don’t ever work. I’ve found it to be a pretty workable rule in living my actual life so far. > such rules more exist as a pretty fiction than as an actual practice I’m curious what life experiences you’ve had which lead you to conclude that “don’t murder people” is so inapplicable as to be fiction. Are you living near Bakhmut?

I mean, war is a trivial counter-example. You're intentionally killing people. There's two ways to go about it. Either you ignore the rules whenever they start getting in the way, or you build huge subjective holes into them.

This does not follow.

You can be required to do things because of external forces that intentionally break the “moral rules” of normal society.

It can be morally wrong to kill a man, but you can still have to do it to defend yourself to survive.

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cultures that don’t practice infanticide are the exception in the historical and anthropological record. Not killing your children was invented by the Egyptians, taken up by the Jews and spread by the Christians, Muslims, presumably other Abrahamic faiths and cultures derived from them. It has not been obvious to the huge majority of people ever born that there was anything wrong with infanticide. If you think it is…

> Cultures that don’t practice infanticide are the exception in the historical and anthropological record That's a non-argument. People did all kinds of horrible things in the past (human sacrifice, cruel corporal punishment, slavery) and yet it is now obvious to us that these things are bad. I think it is safe to say that infanticide is one of the things that we don't need to debate in modern times.

You’re saying that it’s obvious infanticide is wrong. I’m pointing out that most humans ever have disagreed. Then you’re saying it’s obvious again and that it doesn’t need to be debated. Your “argument” is that the current moral fashions of your society are true and that this is obvious to all.

At best this is an attempt at persuasion by “Everyone else is doing it and so should you.”

Re: Peter Singer on utilitarianism, influence, and controversial ideas

#120
post #63
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

a 23 month old human will beg for their life. Doesn't that contradict his position on killing sentient animals?

Do you think dogs and pigs who are aware of what’s about to happen don’t?
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