Magnus Vinding

NEW BOOK! Suffering-Focused Ethics: Defense and Implications "This could be the most important book you will ever read." —@jmayerfeld magnusvinding.com/2020/05/31/suf… amazon.com/dp/B089CSQX73/

New post: What might we infer about optimized futures? "My aim in this post is to explore what we might be able to infer about optimized futures. Most of all, my aim is to advance this as an important question that is worth exploring further." magnusvinding.com/2023/11/18/wha…

@webmasterdave @tomdlal @alistair___s Thanks, David! :) I'm hoping that my next book will be such a book. For now, I've uploaded the following chapter, which seeks to address some of the main challenges: docs.google.com/document/d/1tU…

@tomdlal @alistair___s @MagnusVinding Yes. How does one write a book about suffering and suffering-focused ethics that doesn't leave readers depressed & demoralized rather than fired up for action? I don't know. Anyone who _isn't_ profoundly disturbed by suffering hasn't understood it, but Magnus does a valiant job.

"An adequate theory of value should be as true in the gas chambers of Auschwitz as in the philosopher's study." – David Pearce, 2015

The following is a draft chapter from my forthcoming book. The chapter is titled “Facing the Endeavor to Reduce Extreme Suffering in Healthy Ways”. I hope it can be helpful for those seeking to reduce suffering. docs.google.com/document/d/1tU…

@DavidPinsof But even if we imagine a world where people had been selected not to care about suffering, you don't think we can claim that they're wrong to procreate at the cost of any number of lives full of extreme, ceaseless torment?

@DavidPinsof To clarify: I'm talking about what actual people in our world would do if given that dilemma (not people who've been selected not to care about creating extreme suffering for others).

In my most contrarian post yet, I argue that suffering is actually good and you want to suffer. everythingisbullshit.substack.com/p/you-want-to-…

@DavidPinsof I don't think so. I think all this "dysfunctional suffering" would weigh into people's decisions, and rightly so. We don't just care about fitness, and we're right not to. Or so I'd argue.

@DavidPinsof To take a hypothetical example, if people knew that by creating a child, an evil scientist would elsewhere create a number of people who will be ceaselessly tortured for life, would people never cease from reproducing no matter what the number of tortured people might be?

@DavidPinsof In other words, do you think that people will choose survival and reproductive success at the cost of any amount of torment (as long as there is survival and reproduction)? Do you think they would be right to?

@DavidPinsof And what if there is a high chance of survival that, conditional survival happening, will involve a lifetime of constant unbearable pain (but still survival)?

@DavidPinsof It's not just guilt, since they all plausibly have effects on others in more or less indirect ways. Note, I'm not saying people would accept it if it weren't for the effects on others (other reservations might well persist in the absence of that factor).

@MagnusVinding That’s a testable hypothesis, but I would bet against it. I think I could easily get people to say no to the pill holding suffering to others constant. Just remove the one about guilt—I’d bet most people would still say no. But go ahead and test it.

@DavidPinsof For example, is it dysfunctional to experience extreme suffering while one is being tortured to death by a group of psychopaths (as described in some of the links above)?

@DavidPinsof >But I think we want functional suffering, even if it’s extreme. But then a key issue is how we define "functional suffering", and to what extent it secretly has "conduciveness to reducing future pain and suffering" baked into it.

@DavidPinsof In other words, people generally strongly prefer not suffer, especially when it involves extreme suffering and there are no greater instrumental benefits (e.g. reducing greater suffering).

@DavidPinsof In contrast, it seems that we can devise a compelling thought experiment in the other direction: If people were offered to enter an experience machine where they'l experience torture for a full day, with no instrumental benefits, it seems safe to say that people wouldn't take it.