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It's also not a very big leap from "My purpose is to do whatever is the greatest good" to "It doesn't matter if I hurt people as long as the overall net result
by LargeWu 1y ago
It's also not a very big leap from "My purpose is to do whatever is the greatest good" to "It doesn't matter if I hurt people as long as the overall net result is good (by some arbitrary standard)"
- oh_my_goodness 1y agoI think this is the key comment so far.
- ChadNauseam 1y ago99% of effective altruists and rationalists agree that you shouldn't hurt people as part of some complicated scheme to do good. For example, here is eliezer yudkowsky in 2008 saying exactly that, and explaining why it's true: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/K9ZaZXDnL3SEmYZqB/ends-don-t-justify-means-among-humans https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/K9ZaZXDnL3SEmYZqB/ends-don-t...
- LargeWu 1y agoI believe they believe that, on its face. I also believe that idealistic people will go to great lengths to convince themselves that their desired outcome is, in fact, the moral one. It starts by saying things like, "Well, what is harm, actually..." and then constructing a definition that supports the conclusions they've already arrived at. I'm quite sure Sam Bankman-Fried did not believe he was harming anybody when he lost/stole/defrauded his investors and depositors' money.
- Propelloni 1y agoLike an very old dude once said: "No one is willfully evil."
- m-ee 1y agoThis isn’t a hypothetical leap either. This thinking directly lead to the murders committed by the zizians.