“Here’s an abstract moral question. In 2825, humanity discovers a planet whose entire surface is covered by a single giant alien squid. The squid feels all emotions 10 trillion times deeper than any human. Also, the squid enjoys eating humans. A super-powerful AI calculates that the utility of the universe would be vastly increased if all humans were fed to the squid. The AI would never do anything without consent, but it is very persuasive. What percentage of current Western adults would agree that it is morally correct for the AI to try to convince all humans to agree to allow themselves to be fed to the alien squid? Give a number.” -dyno might
um so yea, if it would create an overall jump in happiness, then i personally agree although i think most western adults would not. is it cause i’m half asian/have collective values? i actually just chalk it up to star trek next gen, that one episode — captain picard not wanting to harm an unknown blobby jellyfish like thingy even though it was sucking all the energy from the ship but they had to shoot a beam at it anyway and then it died and turned out that it was just protecting its baby who was now motherless because of “us.” so then the rest of the episode he did everything he could to get it to safety. ***swoooon***
but in reality, when push comes to shove, i probably wouldn’t sacrifice myself and my entire species for a squid, but you don’t know unless you’ve been tested. guess one question would be if the humans would feel pain when they are being eaten. or would they just look and feel like those cute little nigiri to the left there.