3 ms·

Yes. I think you may be conflating morality and self-preservation.

gruez 5y ago
So if someone held a gun to your head and demanded that you kill someone, and you pulled the trigger, then you're doing something morally wrong? I feel like my sense of morals at least allows for doing something morally wrong if you're being forced to do it.
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  This example is not at all representative of how things actually are. Most of all not for non disenfranchised companies and people. There’s no NATO nation remotely holding a gun to any big companies head. In any sense of the word. I have to think again just wow. Your example is such an extreme stretch with almost no relation to reality.
  - gruez 5y ago
    >Most of all not for non disenfranchised companies and people. What are you arguing here, that if you're not "disenfranchised", you're morally responsible for actions that you're compelled to do? >There’s no NATO nation remotely holding a gun to any big companies head. In any sense of the word. The airlines are also not pulling a trigger on a gun.
- okasaki 5y ago
  Yes, that is morally wrong. Honestly, wtf.
  - xvector 5y ago
    It is absolutely not morally wrong. Self-preservation is not morally wrong, at least not for the 1:1 exchange described here. Things get fuzzier for a 1:N exchange.
    - bluesign 5y ago
      This has been discussed for centuries, I dont think we can reach a judgement here easily
  - pas 5y ago
    It's not so simple. In utilitarian ethics it depends on how people value life. If everyone is equal it doesn't matter, because you trade one life for another. If we allow the system to be higher order and allow for a symmetry split in "self vs other" then self-preservation becomes the moral thing. It consequentalist ethics the previous details can be formalized differently, but it helpfully points out that if you are coerced then someone is coercing you, hence your moral agency is pretty much diminished. Yet if the consequence of your actions is that someone dies and without your actions they wouldn't have died, then sure, it's morally wrong. But that's hard to know when you have to make such a decision. In virtue ethics you can simplify this to simply say that protecting the life of others' is a virtue and shooting people in the head is a vice, so let's do the virtuous thing! (Of course protecting your own life is a virtue too!) (And AI Alignment folks spend pages upon pages discussing these problems of how to even began thinking about a formal ethics that is sort of computable. Should the agent predict the consequences of their possible actions and then compute the utilitarian value of them and thus choose the action that has the most utility? Should the agent factor in the possible actions of the coercer? Should the agent factor in time? If the agent is terminated it cannot maximize future utility. If the agent can live forever by default, then future utility can be much much much more than the utility of "one life". Should then one human life be valued at "infinite + 1"? Are we on a tangent to transfinite ordinals? Yes, yes we are! https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3A50BB9C34AB36B3 https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3A50BB9C34AB36B3 )
- jhoechtl 5y ago
  Survivors of WWII also base their claims against the aggressors on the assumption that despite being held a gun on your head doing the "morally right thing" should prevail. So yes, it is inmoral.
  - gruez 5y ago
    > Survivors of WWII also base their claims against the aggressors on the assumption that despite being held a gun on your head doing the "morally right thing" should prevail. Did they prosecute every single soldier of nazi germany for war crimes? For good measure did they also prosecute every single civil servant of nazi germany, because they helped the regime operate?

So if someone held a gun to your head and demanded that you kill someone, and you pulled the trigger, then you're doing something morally wrong? I feel like my sense of morals at least allows for doing something morally wrong if you're being forced to do it.

skinnymuch 5y ago
This example is not at all representative of how things actually are. Most of all not for non disenfranchised companies and people. There’s no NATO nation remotely holding a gun to any big companies head. In any sense of the word. I have to think again just wow. Your example is such an extreme stretch with almost no relation to reality.
- gruez 5y ago
  >Most of all not for non disenfranchised companies and people. What are you arguing here, that if you're not "disenfranchised", you're morally responsible for actions that you're compelled to do? >There’s no NATO nation remotely holding a gun to any big companies head. In any sense of the word. The airlines are also not pulling a trigger on a gun.
okasaki 5y ago
Yes, that is morally wrong. Honestly, wtf.
- xvector 5y ago
  It is absolutely not morally wrong. Self-preservation is not morally wrong, at least not for the 1:1 exchange described here. Things get fuzzier for a 1:N exchange.
  - bluesign 5y ago
    This has been discussed for centuries, I dont think we can reach a judgement here easily
- pas 5y ago
  It's not so simple. In utilitarian ethics it depends on how people value life. If everyone is equal it doesn't matter, because you trade one life for another. If we allow the system to be higher order and allow for a symmetry split in "self vs other" then self-preservation becomes the moral thing. It consequentalist ethics the previous details can be formalized differently, but it helpfully points out that if you are coerced then someone is coercing you, hence your moral agency is pretty much diminished. Yet if the consequence of your actions is that someone dies and without your actions they wouldn't have died, then sure, it's morally wrong. But that's hard to know when you have to make such a decision. In virtue ethics you can simplify this to simply say that protecting the life of others' is a virtue and shooting people in the head is a vice, so let's do the virtuous thing! (Of course protecting your own life is a virtue too!) (And AI Alignment folks spend pages upon pages discussing these problems of how to even began thinking about a formal ethics that is sort of computable. Should the agent predict the consequences of their possible actions and then compute the utilitarian value of them and thus choose the action that has the most utility? Should the agent factor in the possible actions of the coercer? Should the agent factor in time? If the agent is terminated it cannot maximize future utility. If the agent can live forever by default, then future utility can be much much much more than the utility of "one life". Should then one human life be valued at "infinite + 1"? Are we on a tangent to transfinite ordinals? Yes, yes we are! https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3A50BB9C34AB36B3 https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3A50BB9C34AB36B3 )
jhoechtl 5y ago
Survivors of WWII also base their claims against the aggressors on the assumption that despite being held a gun on your head doing the "morally right thing" should prevail. So yes, it is inmoral.
- gruez 5y ago
  > Survivors of WWII also base their claims against the aggressors on the assumption that despite being held a gun on your head doing the "morally right thing" should prevail. Did they prosecute every single soldier of nazi germany for war crimes? For good measure did they also prosecute every single civil servant of nazi germany, because they helped the regime operate?