Utilitarianism and the replaceability of desires and attachments
Summary Consider a pill that would cause a happy person with a fulfilling life to abandon their most important desires and cherished attachments, including goals, career and loved ones, but increase their lifetime subjective well-being. If what's best for someone is just higher subjective well-being (including even higher lifetime preference/desire satisfaction), then it would be better for them to take the pill. However, it seems to me that if they prefer not to take such a pill, to honour their current specific desires and attachments, it could be worse for them to take it (more). I anticipate some responses and reply to them: People aren’t always right about what's best for themselves. R: That's true, but attitude manipulation is quite different from other cases, where individuals neglect, discount or otherwise misweigh attitudes they do or will have (more). Deontological constraints against involuntary manipulation. R: Deontological constraints could oddly [...] ---Outline:(00:06) Summary(02:26) Acknowledgements(02:45) Manipulating desires and abandoning attachments(10:49) Responses and replies(10:53) People aren’t always right about what's best for themselves(13:22) Deontological constraints(14:38) Indirect reasons(15:56) Incomparability(17:18) Why should I care?(18:30) Avoiding manipulation with preference-affecting viewsThe original text contained 18 footnotes which were omitted from this narration. --- First published: July 27th, 2024 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/erPPy3A3uG7HEdKzu/utilitarianism-and-the-replaceability-of-desires-and --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.