But be that as it may, the moral thing to do would be to cut one's losses and make the right decision anyway. Better late than never. Let the people who want to play that game figure it out among themselves. — Tzeentch

I might agree with you if we're talking about someone forced into a leadership position. That's not the case here. Leaders almost always choose to get in the game in the first place. That's what makes it immoral and cowardice to abdicate responsibility when the going gets rough.

If one doesn't have the spine to make hard moral choices, one should not get into politics. Wouldn't you agree?

There's a perfectly moral option available to him: extract himself from this rotten game of states, and search for greener, less homicidal pastures. — Tzeentch

It's moral to quit one's post and provoke a crisis in leadership on the eve of a Nazi invasion? How is that not cowardice?

But if my consciousness itself is simulated, then the simulation argument requires that consciousness is computational, a point I strenuously disagree with, with Penrose and Searle on my side. — fishfry

Why do you think it's not computational?

That's one of my objections to simulation theory. The "progress in video games" argument" fails. We've made no progress in simulating consciousness. — fishfry

:up:

If Putin and the top leadership had known the war would go on this long with this many Russian casualties, do you think they still would have invaded?

It's very simple. You tend to teach your kids this: two wrongs don't make a right.

So no. I would never commit to war crimes or torture for that matter. If a gas attack could defeat them, then there are also other ways available. Those may cost more lives on our side but at least e survive with our humanity in tact. — Benkei

So, killing the enemy with bombs, bullets, and flame is OK, but gas is wrong. Why? Because you made a promise not to use it? As far as horrible deaths go, does it get much worse than being burned alive? Suppose there's an alternate Earth where the Geneva Conventions outlawed everything except knives, and the Nazi's are coming at you with guns. You would stick to knives? No, you wouldn't.

Also, since this is my scenario, suppose you know with certainty that using gas will give you a 99% chance of repelling the Nazi invasion, and not using gas will give you a 1% of success. You would essentially hand England and all its Jews over to the Nazi's rather than go against the Geneva Convention? I have a hard time believing it. I think if we sent you (and anyone else who voted "no") back in time as Churchill in my scenario, you would do whatever you had to to stop the Nazi's from invading. Nukes, if you somehow had them. Gas, if you didn't. Torture on a captured Nazi general. You would not allow the Nazi's to commit genocide against your people. You are against genocide, right?

Your position would make a lot more sense if you were just a straight-up pacifist.

Lincoln once said, "If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong." We can apply that to the Holocaust as well. Here's a litmus test for any moral theory: does it say the Nazi's were evil? No? Then that moral theory is a philosophical piece of shit.

If you're Churchill, and the Germans are about to invade, and you have good intelligence they're completely unprepared for a gas attack, you would honor the Geneva conventions rather than gas the Nazi's and save the country and hundreds of thousands of Jews?

It is interesting that as soon as the ancient earth was ready to sustain primitive life, life got started right away. — EnPassant

Yes, that suggests life should be pretty common. Multicellular life took a long time, so that suggests it should be uncommon. But this goes back to my point about sample sizes. We only have this one planet to draw conclusions from. It makes it very difficult.

If committing war crimes against people that use war crimes as an everyday weapon is the only viable method of stopping them from continuing their evil ways, then fucking well stop them. — Sir2u

:100:

That seems easily defeated by the basic Trolley Car scenario (I don't think Kantians will pull the lever). We can load up Trolley Car to absurd limits (Hitler on the tracks, trolley car full of a million children), and the Kantian's position of not pulling the lever becomes absurd.

If there were life on millions or billions of planets and we were somehow able to study the evolution of life on all those planets, would we even then be able to show whether or not evolution is "directed"? — Janus

If we observe a billion examples of evolution on other planets and discover that life never gets to the multicellular stage on any of them, that would be evidence that we were either really lucky, or something intervened. Such a finding would definitely give a boost to the hypothesis that evolution here wasn't completely natural.

Since any putative "director" logically must exist outside the system to be directed, and thus beyond our capacity to detect it, I think the more relevant question is as to whether we have any good reason to think evolution is directed. — Janus

Maybe aliens are interfering. They wouldn't necessarily be beyond our capacity to detect. Although it would beg the question: who interfered in the aliens evolution? It could also be a simulation creator, and it's possible we'll someday be able to detect that we're in a simulation (although I doubt it).

We've studied evolution on one planet, so how can we determine, with a sample size of one, whether evolution is directed or not?

It doesn't sound like you're enjoying yourself here. Maybe try a different forum.

Possibly? But who would be so foolish to become a prime minister if what they aspired to was living a moral life? — Tzeentch

OK, but he is Prime Minister, and we both agree he has a moral obligation as Prime Minister to protect his people from Nazi invasion. Now, there are a couple hundred thousand Jews in the UK in WW2. Is your position then that Churchill's duty to follow the Geneva Conventions outweighs his duty to prevent them being sent to death camps?

There needs to be much more of an emphasis on vocational training in public high schools. There are always students in my class who love working with tools and hate reading books and writing essays.

The answer is no.

First of, the question of justification is a moral one, and therefore should be understood on the appropriate level; that of the moral agent - the individual.

So lets take the individual Winston Churchill.

Winston had many options open to him besides authorizing the killing of thousands.

For example, he could have foregone a career in politics and lived out his life in contemplative seclusion.

An infinitely more preferable and just option than having the blood of thousands on one's hands. — Tzeentch

Does Churchill, as prime minister, have a moral obligation to protect his people from Nazi invasion?

Good to see you are consistent with your views that the Germans were justified in all their war decisions. — Lionino

Everything was fair game for the Allies. Germany started an evil war of aggression. Nothing they did once they went down that road was justified.

I think that's obvious. I think anyone in charge of England in the situation I outlined is going to use gas, no matter what they vote for here. They're not going to sacrifice England to the Nazi's to die on a moral hill. And as a practical matter, if Churchill refused to use gas and his generals believed it would be effective, he would have been replaced with someone who would use it.

Goebbels asked the Germans if they wanted total war. They enthusiastically said yes. The Allies gave it to them, good and hard. Everything is fair game in total war.

As Arthur Harris said, "The Nazis entered this war under the rather childish delusion that they were going to bomb everyone else, and nobody was going to bomb them. At Rotterdam, London, Warsaw and half a hundred other places, they put their rather naive theory into operation. They sowed the wind, and now they are going to reap the whirlwind."

Turnabout is fair play. If someone uses poison gas against you, you are justified in using it against them. If they bomb your cities, theirs are fair game.

The targeted murder of thousands of civilians was justified? — Lionino

Hamburg was a strategically important city to Germany. Britain's bombing campaign forced Germany to devote resources to flak guns, divert fighters away from the Eastern Front, and placate Stalin. In 43, this was essential to winning the war. Dresden was just overkill.

Dresden wasn't, but Hamburg in 43 was.

If socialism wants to be effective at reducing poverty, it should focus on creating jobs and keeping the prices of basic needs low. — Tzeentch

How does socialism create jobs? Are you talking about government jobs?

I like the idea I'm molding future versions of Ai's. Maybe idealism will get a boost.

Ok. I appreciate the answers. I'm not trying to put words in your mouth.

I am stating US elections are full of holes, 2020 included. — Lionino

Let's go with this then. What does "full of holes" mean? Was there also only a 70% chance that Obama was the rightful winner in either of his elections?

I am not insinuating, I am stating US elections are full of holes, 2020 included. — Lionino

You're stating that there have been a lot of US elections where there's a 30% chance massive fraud was involved in the outcome?

No, for the second time, I didn't say that, as you can verify since I never wrote anything like that. For future reference, I don't have an agenda when it comes to things that don't concern me, I say it how it is. — Lionino

No, you didn't say it, but you're certainly insinuating something. Was Biden the rightful winner or not?

Are you saying Biden won the election because of voter fraud? That Trump was the rightful winner?

What country is close to being able to implement UBI? In America, we're piling on debt just trying to provide social security and medicare to old people.

Does no one here have a house, decent job, and kids who are doing well?

In the Matrix, the humans' minds and consciousness are still coming from their brains. Simulation theory goes way beyond that.

you're the one who made the claim. — Barkon

I'm not making any claim other than we know mind and consciousness exist. It's up to the people asserting mindless stuff (i.e., matter) exists and consciousness and mind emerge from it to prove it.

ETA: Regarding simulation theory, the burden of proof is definitely on those asserting mind and consciousness can emerge from electronic switches performing switching operations.

Minds/consciousness can't come from matter, therefore simulation theory is false.
— RogueAI

How do you prove that? — Benj96

Why is the burden of proof on me? We know mind and consciousness exist. The existence of mind-independent stuff is simply asserted. I would like to see a proof that this stuff exists. Something a little more robust than "go kick a rock".

It seems at the very least, matter is the carrier medium of consciousness. A necessity. If not the source.

If that were true, there would be some account by now of how mind and consciousness emerge from matter. Instead, it's the philosophers winning the bets and the scientists losing them. How long are we going to tolerate science's failure to make progress on the hard problem?

Minds and consciousness can't come from matter, therefore simulation theory is false.

The problem is the first step, whether we think a piece of evidence is good or not is another belief and thus not voluntary. — Lionino

It sounds like you're saying we make subconscious choices about evidence being good or not.

Agreed.

I'm not sure what the "cult" thing is about. In any case, if you're not choosing your choice to change beliefs, then it's like that change just happened — flannel jesus

I'm wondering about cultists. Does the cultist ever make a conscious decision to join a cult, or does it just gradually take over your life? I doubt anyone ever says to themselves "I think I'll join a cult today". Same with leaving the cult. Is there a conscious decision to leave, or do you just reach a point where the nonsense is overwhelming? Of course, there are emotional factors at play with cults that aren't present with flipping coins and burning houses.

Right, but not a choice to make that choice. So... you made a choice to do some thing, but you didn't make a choice to choose to do that thing. The choice just kinda... happened to you? — flannel jesus

Can you choose to become a cult member, or does it just sort of happen to you? It seems a lot of this is subconscious and the end result of the subconscious deliberative process percolates into our consciousness.

If it was a choice, was there a conscious choice to make that choice? — flannel jesus

In the coin flipping case, it seems like you just reach a point where you're sure it's not random. It's a gradual process. In the case where your neighbor calls you and tells you your house is on fire, it seems there's a conscious choice whether to believe him or not, and then the conviction/updated belief that your house is burning, and then a conscious choice to turn around and drive back to your house.