The Moral Copernican Principle

post by Legionnaire · 2023-05-02T03:25:40.142Z · LW · GW · 7 comments

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You ever see people arguing about whether some facet of another culture is good or bad, when suddenly one of them declares the moral high ground can't exist because obviously moral relativity is true? Well that line of reasoning is nonsense, but I don't think people know how to respond to it very well, so it often wins the argument. Consider this article a countermeasure you can reach for.

Moral absolutists say things like "killing is always wrong" and believe that aliens and AI will converge on our moral beliefs.^[1]
Moral relativists say things like "it's just their culture, who are we to say" and believe it's not wrong for other cultures to have practices we deem immoral.

I think they often both manage to be wrong. Let's translate these archetypes to their physical equivalents. Imagine two people talking about whether to go to Mars:
"Earth is the center of civilization and life. It is objectively the best location to be! Mars is very far away and inhospitable."
"Relativity tells us there is no special location, or even reference frame, in the universe! To Mars, we're the ones that are very far away."

We know physical relativity is true, but that doesn't prevent us from talking about locations with regard to their utility to us, or distances being a valid concept.^[2] Earth really is objectively easier to get to and more hospitable for every human since we share important traits like wanting to breath oxygen. Yet that doesn't prove that Mars has no useful resources, or that there are no exoplanets that are even better than Earth. Plus there are likely aliens that would enjoy Mars more than Earth. We may not occupy a "privileged position", but we as humans have bodies that evolved for certain conditions, and thus a few special positions. ^[3]

Similarly, moral relativism does not prove that all moral locations are equally hospitable for humans, because we have brains that evolved for specific conditions. Different locations can be objectively better or worse for every single homo sapien that finds themselves there. When a tribe on the other side of the world burns a witch at the stake for crop failure, the humans there are not that different from us. We're correct in saying that's a bad idea, especially having already tried that particular solution ourselves.

I would consider myself one, but I see a lot of moral relativists make the mistake of assuming no location is better than any other for human flourishing while moral absolutists fail to notice how many better locations exist for humans, or realize how many alien forms are possible. One of these common mistakes will likely have lasting negative impacts on the development of AI minds.

1. ^{^}

   Scott Aaronson and many others.

2. ^{^}

   Quippy version: Einstein's relativity didn't prove Mt. Everest isn't tall. 

3. ^{^}

    I think this is what Sam Harris is trying to say in The Moral Landscape and while arguing against the Is-Ought distinction. But the Is-Ought distinction is still correct, and science isn't going to be able to tell us about a universal moral framework that aliens will be on board with. Science can specifically tell us about common human values though.

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