Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > They're not just simulating us, are they? They might have just slapped > together a virtual universe in an idle moment to see how it turns out. Maybe > they're more interested in star formation, or bacteria or something. Is an E. > coli > in your gut justified in thinking God made the universe, including human guts, > just for its benefit?
Stathis I see what you mean, of course. However, it's not really what I was trying to elicit by my original post. If I were to try to justify my actions to you in the sort of way you describe above, I don't think you'd be very accepting of this, nor would much of the rest of society. I don't mean to say that there isn't a great deal of hypocrisy and deviation from ethical conduct in the real world, but unless one is prepared to discard the project of working together to make things better rather than worse, I believe that we should take ethical dialogue seriously. My sense is that much more advanced civilisations would have developed in this area too, not just technologically - for one thing, they have presumably found ways to live in harmony and not self-destruct. So at the least these issues would have meaning for them. That's why I feel that your dismissal of the issues isn't very illuminating. BTW, I don't intend this as a complaint, I'm just clarifying what I had in mind in my original questions - that it would be interesting to explore the ethical dimensions of possible simulaters and their simulations. I think you're saying that we can't know and shouldn't care, which I don't find very interesting. As a challenge to your view, might I suggest that in your example re the E. coli - if we knew that the E. coli was conscious and had feelings, we might be more concerned about it. Do you think it's a reasonable assumption that technologists capable enough to include us in their simulation, regardless of their 'ultimate purpose', would a) not know we had consciousness and feelings, or b) not care, and if so, on what justification? Or is this simply unfathomable? I'm not asking rhetorically, I'm really interested. David > Brent Meeker writes: > > > David Nyman wrote: > > > Stathis Papaioannou wrote: > > > > > > > > >>Perhaps it says something about the nature of the simulation's creators, > > >>but I don't see that it says anything about the probability that we are > > >>living in one. > > > > > > > > > Do you mean that if we are living in one, then the moral standards of > > > its creators are reprehensible (to our way of thinking) or at least > > > opaque? > > > > But the hypothesis that the creators are like us is part of the > > justification for supposing they would run simulations of intelligent > > beings. If you then argue that their motivations and ethics might be alien > > to us, you've discarded any reason for supposing they would simulate us. > > They're not just simulating us, are they? They might have just slapped > together a virtual universe in an idle moment to see how it turns out. Maybe > they're more interested in star formation, or bacteria or something. Is an E. > coli > in your gut justified in thinking God made the universe, including human guts, > just for its benefit? > > Stathis Papaioannou > _________________________________________________________________ > Be one of the first to try Windows Live Mail. > http://ideas.live.com/programpage.aspx?versionId=5d21c51a-b161-4314-9b0e-4911fb2b2e6d --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
