When he speaks of S,C,M&R, I think he primarily comes to the conclusion of 5 basic tenets of a moral theory (centering around actions and motives primarily) as a crux of what he says. Further, any case of agent relative moral theories runs into each-we dilemmas ie is directly collectively self defeating despite perhaps not failing in their own terms. Agent neutral avoids this problem as each works towards a singular goal, as opposed to each working towards some individual goal. Agent relative Deontological consequentialism is one explicit case he mentions, and it shows how all forms of consequentialism that we more traditionally associate with consequentialism are likewise susceptible (where deontological theories are taken to be less focused on consequentialism where it is our substantive aim - though we take for granted that this aim is substantive in that we further believe it achieves the best outcome by following it). Whilst these might not be the overarching conclusions he comes to, these are some I took away - each effectively must do either what is agent neutrally best for him, or what is worse for him, to do what is best for the "we" that he is a member of. I think his conclusion in the teleportation thought experiment is that in both cases they are different people; the latter case makes this very clear for the former case, where this former is more subtle. If there can be two of me existing at the same time, clearly they aren't each "me". At the very moment of cloning we are identical, then form different memories and become completely different; but at this original point, we are not the same person. The way I look at it is that if you had to will death upon your clone or yourself, or your clone had to do likewise, you clearly would choose for yourself (but maybe not in an extreme where you are certain you will die, and you have the opportunity to extend your life for a trivial amount of time, say 5 seconds, or save the other - but it is likely you would do the same for some random person. For all intents and purposes they are another person to you. This case is plausible, and by no means is my argument as bulletproof as parfit's here, but no doubt such a thought experiment could be constructed with enough deliberation to show this decision would be applicable). Thus you are your own moral agent and so is your clone. The only difference with the case where I'm disintegrated straight away is that I'm disintegrated straight away; one version of me exists on earth and the other on Mars, each moral agents who may act as said above. He comes to the conclusion that these are different people, so you are killing yourself on earth and creating another version of yourself, that is not you despite sharing the same memories and everything at that point in time given each is their own moral agent and is thus, from a Cartesian ego perspective, each the owner of a different soul (my above case can provide some evidence for these individual egos). The above is my own interpretation and conjecture, so a large pinch of salt ought to be taken.
I would love to respond to this in an intelligent way Cameron but it's early morning here and I honestly I'm just not smart enough haha. This is the type of book I would maybe try again in 30 years time when I've had more time to read other philosophy and have the time to deeply ponder over it sentence by sentence.
@@MereMortalsBookReviews Not that I'm super well versed in moral philosophy but this book just seems like it's near the endgame of its field (or at least, like other fields of thought, we have progressed so far that in order to notably contribute one has to specialise and spend so much time in order to get there - for this reason, we have far fewer polymaths than in the past). I think to start to even attempt to refute his claims you need to have an extremely comprehensive understanding of the surrounding literature. So I think you're definitely smart enough, you would just have to dedicate copious amounts of time to it. It seems like you'll be on the right path in 30 years though! I'll definitely have to do the same - not that I'll be complaining.
Yeah you're probably right, it's more the time needed to really get into these things. I am drawn to them so it is possible I'll read enough to get there, but it certainly will take a while. The year I did this review I was forcing myself to read more philosophy and I came away less sane than entering haha. And you're right. Reasons and Persons is close to the boss level fight (at the very least a sub-boss) and so I probably should have leveled up on some easier stuff before having a shot. I found the first 5th reasonably understandable but then got lost in the weeds of semantics.
Hey Alwys. Good luck, it's a monster of a book and whilst I 'read' it I can't say that I fully comprehended everything he was trying to get across. Just a bit too dense in the end. Hope that you get some value from it! Let me know what you think when/if you finish it 😃
@@MereMortalsBookReviews Thanks! I will admit your video made me think twice about reading the whole thing. I'm basically aiming for an exercise in more critical thinking - I have a tendency whilst reading philosophy to sort of just subconsciously agree with whatever's on he page, "oh yeah that sounds about right," and hoping that Parfit's constant theory dispelling and counter balancing will help me to spot potential fallacies/paradoxes etc. Lets see how that goes...
While I've got your attention, you got any baseline recommendations of what you read early on that you felt really helped/shifted the way think critically about theory? Been on a bit of a phenomenology binge recently and its been really eye opening.
Yeah I'm mostly along those same lines. If they make a statement or propose a theory I tend to agree by default. Unless it's a bit wacky or conflicts with other things I've read or know. Finding the 'Truth' is a long exhausting journey!
Hmm nothing super jumps out other than evolutionary books in general (The Red Queen by Matt Ridley and Dawkins books). I think it's the purest example of the Scientific Method in practice and this has helped me steer clear of a lot of things based on guesses or conjecture. Sam Harris books have also helped me make better sense of the world as well
When he speaks of S,C,M&R, I think he primarily comes to the conclusion of 5 basic tenets of a moral theory (centering around actions and motives primarily) as a crux of what he says. Further, any case of agent relative moral theories runs into each-we dilemmas ie is directly collectively self defeating despite perhaps not failing in their own terms. Agent neutral avoids this problem as each works towards a singular goal, as opposed to each working towards some individual goal. Agent relative Deontological consequentialism is one explicit case he mentions, and it shows how all forms of consequentialism that we more traditionally associate with consequentialism are likewise susceptible (where deontological theories are taken to be less focused on consequentialism where it is our substantive aim - though we take for granted that this aim is substantive in that we further believe it achieves the best outcome by following it). Whilst these might not be the overarching conclusions he comes to, these are some I took away - each effectively must do either what is agent neutrally best for him, or what is worse for him, to do what is best for the "we" that he is a member of.
I think his conclusion in the teleportation thought experiment is that in both cases they are different people; the latter case makes this very clear for the former case, where this former is more subtle. If there can be two of me existing at the same time, clearly they aren't each "me". At the very moment of cloning we are identical, then form different memories and become completely different; but at this original point, we are not the same person. The way I look at it is that if you had to will death upon your clone or yourself, or your clone had to do likewise, you clearly would choose for yourself (but maybe not in an extreme where you are certain you will die, and you have the opportunity to extend your life for a trivial amount of time, say 5 seconds, or save the other - but it is likely you would do the same for some random person. For all intents and purposes they are another person to you. This case is plausible, and by no means is my argument as bulletproof as parfit's here, but no doubt such a thought experiment could be constructed with enough deliberation to show this decision would be applicable). Thus you are your own moral agent and so is your clone.
The only difference with the case where I'm disintegrated straight away is that I'm disintegrated straight away; one version of me exists on earth and the other on Mars, each moral agents who may act as said above.
He comes to the conclusion that these are different people, so you are killing yourself on earth and creating another version of yourself, that is not you despite sharing the same memories and everything at that point in time given each is their own moral agent and is thus, from a Cartesian ego perspective, each the owner of a different soul (my above case can provide some evidence for these individual egos).
The above is my own interpretation and conjecture, so a large pinch of salt ought to be taken.
I would love to respond to this in an intelligent way Cameron but it's early morning here and I honestly I'm just not smart enough haha. This is the type of book I would maybe try again in 30 years time when I've had more time to read other philosophy and have the time to deeply ponder over it sentence by sentence.
@@MereMortalsBookReviews
Not that I'm super well versed in moral philosophy but this book just seems like it's near the endgame of its field (or at least, like other fields of thought, we have progressed so far that in order to notably contribute one has to specialise and spend so much time in order to get there - for this reason, we have far fewer polymaths than in the past).
I think to start to even attempt to refute his claims you need to have an extremely comprehensive understanding of the surrounding literature. So I think you're definitely smart enough, you would just have to dedicate copious amounts of time to it. It seems like you'll be on the right path in 30 years though! I'll definitely have to do the same - not that I'll be complaining.
Yeah you're probably right, it's more the time needed to really get into these things. I am drawn to them so it is possible I'll read enough to get there, but it certainly will take a while. The year I did this review I was forcing myself to read more philosophy and I came away less sane than entering haha.
And you're right. Reasons and Persons is close to the boss level fight (at the very least a sub-boss) and so I probably should have leveled up on some easier stuff before having a shot. I found the first 5th reasonably understandable but then got lost in the weeds of semantics.
Can confirm much preferred listening to the review than wanting to read the whole book
Saved you 20 hours of rather unpleasant reading. You can pay me in BTC Juanye West
Nice review!!
Cheers Zach you bloody legend 🤙
Cracking video, getting stuck into the book and relatively new to such heavy stuff, so the overview was hugely helpful. Big thanks from Scotland
Hey Alwys. Good luck, it's a monster of a book and whilst I 'read' it I can't say that I fully comprehended everything he was trying to get across. Just a bit too dense in the end. Hope that you get some value from it! Let me know what you think when/if you finish it 😃
@@MereMortalsBookReviews Thanks! I will admit your video made me think twice about reading the whole thing. I'm basically aiming for an exercise in more critical thinking - I have a tendency whilst reading philosophy to sort of just subconsciously agree with whatever's on he page, "oh yeah that sounds about right," and hoping that Parfit's constant theory dispelling and counter balancing will help me to spot potential fallacies/paradoxes etc. Lets see how that goes...
While I've got your attention, you got any baseline recommendations of what you read early on that you felt really helped/shifted the way think critically about theory? Been on a bit of a phenomenology binge recently and its been really eye opening.
Yeah I'm mostly along those same lines. If they make a statement or propose a theory I tend to agree by default. Unless it's a bit wacky or conflicts with other things I've read or know. Finding the 'Truth' is a long exhausting journey!
Hmm nothing super jumps out other than evolutionary books in general (The Red Queen by Matt Ridley and Dawkins books). I think it's the purest example of the Scientific Method in practice and this has helped me steer clear of a lot of things based on guesses or conjecture.
Sam Harris books have also helped me make better sense of the world as well