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If you are a moral relativist, as I suspect most HN readers are, then nothing I propose will satisfy you because we disagree philosophically on a fundamental et

If you are a moral relativist, as I suspect most HN readers are, then nothing I propose will satisfy you because we disagree philosophically on a fundamental ethics question: are there moral absolutes? If we could agree on that, then we could have a conversation about which of the absolutes are worthy of inclusion, in which case, the Ten Commandments would be a great starting point (not all but some).

jakefromstatecs 9mo ago
> are there moral absolutes? Even if there are, wouldn't the process of finding them effectively mirror moral relativism?.. Assuming that slavery was always immoral, we culturally discovered that fact at some point which appears the same as if it were a culturally relativistic value
- joshuamcginnis 9mo ago
  You think we discovered that slavery was always immoral? If we "discover" things which were wrong to be now right, then you are making the case for moral relativism. I would argue slavery is absolutely wrong and has always been, despite cultural acceptance.
  - JoshTriplett 9mo ago
    How will you feel when you "discover" other things are wrong that you currently believe are right? How will you feel when others discover such things and you haven't caught up yet? How can you best avoid holding back the pace of such discovery? It is a useful exercise to attempt to iterate some of those "discovery" processes to their logical conclusions, rather than repeatedly making "discoveries" of the same sort that all fundamentally rhyme with each other and have common underlying principles.
__MatrixMan__ 9mo ago
Right, so given that agreement on the existence of absolutes is unlikely, let alone moral ones. And that even if it were achieved, agreement on what they are is also unlikely. Isn't it pragmatic to attempt an implementation of something a bit more handwavey? The alternative is that you get outpaced by a competitor which doesn't bother with addressing ethics at all.
deleted 9mo ago
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spot 9mo ago
> the Ten Commandments would be a great starting point (not all but some). i think you missed "hubris" :)
foxygen 9mo ago
Why would it be a good starting point? And why only some of them? What is the process behind objectively finding out which ones are good and which ones are bad?
- joshuamcginnis 9mo ago
  It's a good starting point because the commandments were given by God. And without God, there is no objective moral standard. Everything, including your opinion on my point of view, is subjective and relative. Whatever one would want to call "good" or "evil" would just be a matter of opinion.
  - donkeybeer 9mo ago
    Thats all very nice, but first prove god. If you are done solving that question, next prove that the book you favor is from god. There's a lot of competition for this claim as you know.
rungeen__panda 9mo ago
> the Ten Commandments would be a great starting point (not all but some). if morals are absolute then why exclude some of the commandments?
- joshuamcginnis 9mo ago
  The Ten Commandments are commandments and not a list of moral absolutes. Not all of the commandments are relevant to the functioning of an ethical LLM. For example, the first commandment is "I am the Lord thy God. Thou shall not have strange gods before Me."

jakefromstatecs 9mo ago

> are there moral absolutes? Even if there are, wouldn't the process of finding them effectively mirror moral relativism?.. Assuming that slavery was always immoral, we culturally discovered that fact at some point which appears the same as if it were a culturally relativistic value

joshuamcginnis 9mo ago
You think we discovered that slavery was always immoral? If we "discover" things which were wrong to be now right, then you are making the case for moral relativism. I would argue slavery is absolutely wrong and has always been, despite cultural acceptance.
- JoshTriplett 9mo ago
  How will you feel when you "discover" other things are wrong that you currently believe are right? How will you feel when others discover such things and you haven't caught up yet? How can you best avoid holding back the pace of such discovery? It is a useful exercise to attempt to iterate some of those "discovery" processes to their logical conclusions, rather than repeatedly making "discoveries" of the same sort that all fundamentally rhyme with each other and have common underlying principles.

__MatrixMan__ 9mo ago

Right, so given that agreement on the existence of absolutes is unlikely, let alone moral ones. And that even if it were achieved, agreement on what they are is also unlikely. Isn't it pragmatic to attempt an implementation of something a bit more handwavey? The alternative is that you get outpaced by a competitor which doesn't bother with addressing ethics at all.

deleted 9mo ago

[deleted]

spot 9mo ago

> the Ten Commandments would be a great starting point (not all but some). i think you missed "hubris" :)

foxygen 9mo ago

Why would it be a good starting point? And why only some of them? What is the process behind objectively finding out which ones are good and which ones are bad?

joshuamcginnis 9mo ago
It's a good starting point because the commandments were given by God. And without God, there is no objective moral standard. Everything, including your opinion on my point of view, is subjective and relative. Whatever one would want to call "good" or "evil" would just be a matter of opinion.
- donkeybeer 9mo ago
  Thats all very nice, but first prove god. If you are done solving that question, next prove that the book you favor is from god. There's a lot of competition for this claim as you know.

rungeen__panda 9mo ago

> the Ten Commandments would be a great starting point (not all but some). if morals are absolute then why exclude some of the commandments?

joshuamcginnis 9mo ago
The Ten Commandments are commandments and not a list of moral absolutes. Not all of the commandments are relevant to the functioning of an ethical LLM. For example, the first commandment is "I am the Lord thy God. Thou shall not have strange gods before Me."