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No Son of Mine Is Going to Be a Benthamite
- senectus1 7y agoWhat is this? Facebook for the intelligentsia?
- duxup 7y agoCan someone explain what I just read?
- tptacek 7y agoA McSweeney's piece about Bentham vs. Mill utilitarianism. If you're interested, they also have some interesting things to say about the upcoming decorative gourd season.
- avs733 7y agoMotherfuckers
- Noumenon72 7y agoA parody of how religious parents raise their children so that churches who allow adult baptism or female pastors barely even count as Christian, presenting these differences as though no good person doubts them. I may be projecting a little bit.
- pjm331 7y agoHah seems pretty spot on to me. Was raised RC and always marveled at certain family members’ ability to become irate over small differences like these. Religion/Philosophy (really many parts of the human experience), is often like DNA - 99.9% the same but it’s the 0.01% difference that gets all the attention
- sterlind 7y agoReminds me of what little I know of the split between the Salafi Muslims and the Sunni. IIRC, despite Salafi Islam developing from the teachings of Sunni cleric al-Wahhab, they view other Muslims as apostates, practicing shirk and therefore unforgivable sinners. On the Christian side, some Seventh-Day Adventists apparently see the Catholic church as the "Whore of Babylon" and the pope as the antichrist. [0] Maybe the closeness between two groups just means they can be really detailed and exact about why they hate each other. 0. https://www.catholic.com/tract/seventh-day-adventism https://www.catholic.com/tract/seventh-day-adventism
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- jacobolus 7y ago> some Seventh-Day Adventists apparently see the Catholic church as the "Whore of Babylon" That’s probably not too far off. My impression is that the Hebrew Bible was written by nomadic shepherds who despised cosmopolitan city-dwellers who they thought had loose morals. And similarly for the authors of the New Testament, who despised the Roman Empire of the day (“Babylon” here is thought to be a stand-in for Rome). It is quite ironic that this became the holy teaching of the state religion of the Roman Empire a few centuries later. (Disclaimer: I am not a religious person and am by no means an expert on the Bible.)
- duxup 7y ago>9.9% the same but it’s the 0.01% difference that gets all the attention Ah the good old: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_differences https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narcissism_of_small_difference... Also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WboggjN_G-4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WboggjN_G-4
- waterhouse 7y agoOnce I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?" He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region." I said, "Me, too!" Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912." I said, "Die, heretic!" And I pushed him over.
- Avshalom 7y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3fAcxcxoZ8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3fAcxcxoZ8
- jawns 7y agoI know of no Christian denomination that prohibits adult baptism. But there are some that don't regard infant baptism as authentic. https://www.catholic.com/tract/infant-baptism https://www.catholic.com/tract/infant-baptism
- TheCoelacanth 7y agoDenominations that practice infant baptism typically don't allow adults who were baptized as infants to be baptized. In fact, they imprisoned and executed many people for doing so. Denominations that don't practice infant baptism would allow those adults to be baptized because they don't regard the first one as authentic.
- jawns 7y agoDo you have a source for the claim related to imprisonment/execution in your first paragraph? It's true that denominations that practice infant baptism usually don't allow adults who were baptized as infants to be re-baptized, because they consider the person to be already baptized, so there's no need. But even in cases where denominations try diligently to avoid the case where they're conferring baptism on someone who may have already been baptized (as in the case of the Catholic church and conditional baptism), there are no penalties for baptizing someone who was already baptized. It's just sort of a pointless thing, unless you reject the idea that infant baptism is legitimate, in which case why belong to a denomination that practices infant baptism? Maybe there were penalties in the past that I'm not aware of, so I'd love to learn more about the executions.
- TheCoelacanth 7y agoThis Washington Post article gives a good overview[1]. It's true that they don't execute people for it anymore, but that's just because they have eased up on their treatment of heretics in general, not because they have started condoning the practice. [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2004/06/19/atonement-for-2-centuries-of-persecution/7d724d0f-5e13-4c2c-b1f1-880f6e10f120/?noredirect=on https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/2004/06/19/aton...
- onemoresoop 7y agoIt’s satire
- paggle 7y agoIt’s a satire illustrating the phenomenon of people getting into the most acrimonious fights with the people ideologically closest to them. It’s likely specifically directed at American liberals and their tendency to viciously claw at each other over whether Bernie’s record on race is ideologically pure enough or Hillary is too “establishment,” weakening the pursuit of their common interests against opponents who are a million times farther from them than the gap between them.
- tomlock 7y agoI think a more straightforward reading is that it is satire directed at religious people.
- paggle 7y agoOf course that’s the more straightforward reading. An even more straightforward reading is the literal one. Different readers choose different levels of indirection.
- tomlock 7y agoThat's a very postmodern take! I personally think that most people will read this as a criticism of religious schisms, particularly considering the obvious implication that it's a parent talking to a child, rather than peers within an ideology. Also interesting it'd supposedly be taken as a criticism of a particular political ideology when all ideologies have schisms.
- viraptor 7y ago> considering the obvious implication that it's a parent talking to a child This made me wonder how many kids are switching to a different branch of religion. I've seen a bit of moving to a completely different faith / no religion, but almost changes of denomination.
- yew 7y agoI would expect it depends on personal experience. All ideologies have schisms, as you say. The first thing that came to my mind was the local liberal and "materialist" (that is, Marxist) contingents fighting over definitions. (And that does involve a few parents!) But it's equally reminiscent of childhood Catholic versus Protestant conflicts. I only have more recent experience of one to privilege it over the other.
- sitkack 7y agoVi vs Emacs for a branch of philosophy.
- _iyig 7y agoThe idea is that the reader - briefly acquainted with Bentham and Mill as part of their undergraduate education - has a smug, knowing chuckle when they recognize these references. (Similar to “clapter,” I’d call this a “snuckle” piece.) The quality of the satire itself is irrelevant. Substantive satire is actually impossible: the author briefly recaps Mill and Bentham’s differences for that “oh yeah, I remember now” feel-good reader moment, but can’t get too far into the details as this would alienate the reader, reminding them just how much of their education they’ve forgotten (if they ever did the assigned readings in the first place). Cynical attitude aside, I’m not sure why this is on HN. It doesn’t seem particularly insightful, interesting, or funny.
- Throw_Away_9812 7y agoNot sure why you were down-voted. That's obviously the main value of the thing. Maybe you've hit a wound spot. >Cynical attitude aside, I’m not sure why this is on HN. It doesn’t seem particularly insightful, interesting, or funny. The average HN reader does probably know enough about philosophy to know the differences between Bentham and Mill but not enough to make that seem trivial.
- tomlock 7y agoAs a smug postgraduate I find it kinda odd I'd be called out as an undergraduate, since I found the article funny. Cheers.
- _iyig 7y agoI’m generalizing based on my own experience here (and taking some polemic license), but that’s all one can do. If I’ve misjudged the HN audience and enough do appreciate this link, I can’t/won’t argue with their upvotes!
- dr_dshiv 7y agoThe article is an enjoyable and novel intro to philosophies regarding the underlying value systems that we optimize for as a society. That is intellectually interesting to me.
- Camillo 7y agoA piece of period metafiction set in 2003.
- hirundo 7y ago> In this family, we want to maximize the overall quantity AND the quality of individual happiness (like John Stuart Mill). I can't see that sentience and the quality of individual happiness are necessarily related. It may be that some other species is capable of sustaining a higher quality of happiness. If, for example, that species turns out to be a kind of duck, are John Stuart Mill utilitarians obligated to maximize the quantity of very happy ducks over happy humans?
- chrstphrhrt 7y agoHmmm, so is the prose intending a logical AND? If so it would seem that we couldn't discount the prior quantity of non-duck happiness and would somehow need to hold the two types of happiness in balance. I'm not familiar with Mill or Bentham. What would a "preponderance" of the evidence on both sides look like if there were to be a balance, I wonder? Can we even compare quantity and quality in any way?
- samizdatum 7y ago> See, in this family, we DON’T just want to maximize the overall quantity of individual happiness (like Bentham). No… In this family, we want to maximize the overall quantity AND the quality of individual happiness (like John Stuart Mill). But daaad, this now becomes a multi-objective optimization problem, and there are potentially an infinite number of solutions that lie along the Pareto frontier...
- Judgmentality 7y agoI don't know. The solution might be as simple as "make one person very very happy." https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/2012-04-03 https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/2012-04-03
- mattigames 7y agoWell that's just a bug in the machine for measuring happiness using the average instead of the median.
- samizdatum 7y agoMaximin is probably better for avoiding those pesky "torture/enslave half of humanity" scenarios.
- waterhouse 7y agoHmm, really? Maximin = maximizing the minimum, right? Seems like it could also lead to "Find the people with the most difficult-to-cure genetic conditions and/or abusive upbringings that make them extremely unhappy, and enslave the rest of humanity to try to find cures for them." Unless pumping such people with dopamine or whatever is considered a solution. (Or killing them.)
- DuskStar 7y agoIf your algorithm accounts for future states - and it'll have to, to be practical - "assigning minimal resources to the really unhappy people to let them die from neglect" is also part of the set of options.
- inflatableDodo 7y agoThis reminded me of an old Emo Philips joke; Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?" He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912." I said, "Die, heretic!" And I pushed him over the bridge.
- garbre 7y agoThis is a "cutesey-perhaps-too-cutesey" reminder of the stuff I forgot after my highschool time doing Lincoln-Douglas debate on the speech team.
- brudgers 7y agoI know a lot of the article is tongue in cheek...it's Mcsweeney's after all. Yet, the absence of Peter Singer from the discussion disappoints me. Utilitarianism is not a 19th century fossil and Singer's utilitarian reasoning is arguably (in an academic sense, not just because it's the internet) one of the most important positions in 20th century moral philosophy. It's hard to name another philosopher from the past fifty years who has had similar impact on people's behavior and secular moral discourse.
- GavinMcG 7y agoSeeing as it's making fun of a fossilized religious fundamentalism, it's appropriate to leave out more contemporary positions.
- wpq0 7y agoFor the uninitiated like me, there's a funny and accessible Crash Course episode about this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a739VjqdSI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a739VjqdSI
- southerndrift 7y agoSeems like the father forgot about Dostoyevsky: >Man is unhappy because he doesn't know he's happy. It's only that. [1] [1] https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoyevsky https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoyevsky
- southerndrift 7y ago... implying that happiness is not scalar. But if happiness is not measurable, what does utilitarianism measure? The amount of pain - or rather the lack thereof?
- Der_Einzige 7y agoWhat you are describing is called "Negative Utilitarianism"
- slavik81 7y agoI found John Stuart Mill's life to be interesting. John's father was a radical and a prominent Benthamite. He raised his son to be the lion of their cause, and home schooled John to avoid the the state education system. John's father felt that the state schools instilled too much conformity and discouraged independent thinking. For a time, John Stuart Mill was indeed a lion for his father's ideals. However, it should perhaps not be too terribly surprising that Stuart's independent thinking lead him to somewhat diverge from his father's perspectives. One of the more important moments for that was in his twenties. John came to realize that even if all the reforms he wished for came to pass, he would still be unhappy. That realization lead to a nervous breakdown. He slowly recovered, reworking his father's philosophy into something that would allow him to live a life worth living.
- C1sc0cat 7y agoThis reminds me of the "Die, heretic!" routine that Emo Philips does. As well as putting it less kindly the "hobbyist" elements in the Libdems and Labour in the UK
- dr_dshiv 7y agoFrancis Hutcheson, Adam Smith's dissertation advisor, originated the statement "the greatest happiness for the greatest number" in 1725. His overall philosophy for "moral computation" is incredibly relevant today. He advocated a common source for value in the notion of harmony, in both ethics and aesthetics. He was probably the most influential contemporary philosopher for the American founding fathers. Also, he was apparently an incredible all-around guy. Adam Smith referred to him as "the never-to-be-forgotten Hutcheson". So go Wikipedia the dude and consider yourself smarter.
- namelosw 7y agoEvery time I read it, I think of a scenario: Say we can build a roman colosseum with brutal games between human, with advanced technology - that people enjoy brutal games (of course there are people like it as it was popular and people like brutal movies) can see the game on something like the internet easily. And you can increase the size of the world and the overall population infinitely, assuming the technology will still valid to broadcast.
- HNcantBtrustd 7y agoWhat a hard read. Recommend saying what you want, no silly fake dialog needed.