Almost There Dogwise

[David Sklansky]

You guys will be the death of me. One sentence this time.

You must check a box after which a random human will die six hours sooner than his time or three ownerless dogs will be excruciatingly tortured for a half an hour.

Also to kidluck: What is the official difference between values and morals?

[malorum]

[ QUOTE ]
You must check a box after which a random human will die six hours sooner than his time or three ownerless dogs will be excruciatingly tortured for a half an hour.


[/ QUOTE ]

Oh cool. Now I see what your asking. At last. I think u still have some way to go with the question though.

The answer (for each individual) could then be potentially be found by using a questionaire, but I hope the attempt to formulate this below highlights the deficits in your question as presented. I trust you will do better next time:

1. Place a personal utility between 1 and 100 on how you would feel about shortening a persons life by n%

to find 'n' you need to specify the age or life expectancy of the person.
You suggest a 'random' selection of individuals.
so 'n' may vary between 100 and 5.8 x 10 ^-6
The distribution would depend on demographic data and
this means however you may select a baby due to die painlessly six hours after birth, and you would thus deprive the child of life altogether (this could be good or bad for parents or child.)What matters in the utilitarian analysis is weather you would feel worse about this than about the woman who is 120 losing a few hours.

My first approximation is that it is more usefull to view a shortening of life in terms of a % of total lifetime, for the purposes of such analyses.

The problem is that the first part of this analysis becomes compplex because of variations in life expectancy.

The latter part of the analysis about the dogs, is possibly simpler. You have to place a weighting on how bad the decision maker feels about three dogs suffering for the given period of time.
I'm not sure why the number three is used. I suspect most humans use a non-linear weighting when it comes to the number of animals suffering and how they feel about it (Do you eat eggs from battery farmed hens?)


Good luck, and God speed in your quest for the perfect question.

[FlFishOn]

After that animals in order of complexity.

[Non_Comformist]

I choose the box which doesn't result in the dogs being tortured.

[m1illion]

I am assuming I can't check both?

[Lestat]

I still do not believe the last 6 hours of life is worth torture of any kind. In fact, I would forego the last 6 hours of my own life to prevent any intelligent animal's torture. I say intelligent, because while I'm not sure about a turtle, or even a mouse, I am sure about dogs, cats, maybe a grizzly bear, etc. Intelligent enough to feel and possibly worry about the level of pain I assume you're referring to.

While I clearly have some logic problems, I do believe my answers and logic behind those answers have been consitent with this series of questions. I'm anxious to hear where you're going with this.

[DougShrapnel]

Once you reduce this question to is 1 time increament of animal suffering worth spending for 1 time increament of human life. It's a simple yes.

[ QUOTE ]
I choose the box which doesn't result in the dogs being tortured.

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Very thoughtful and excellent post!!!! but i must ask, considering the original question, why?

[Cyrus]

[ QUOTE ]
One sentence this time. You must check a box after which a random human will die six hours sooner than his time or three ownerless dogs will be excruciatingly tortured for a half an hour.

[/ QUOTE ]
I understand that by "ownerless" you wanna say that no human will emotionally suffer from the dog's torture. So we have to pick six stray dogs from the street.

Plus, to be consistent, you must be assuming that no human will suffer emotionally from the death of the "random human" - which obliges us to pick our "random human" from a pool of absolutely certain, 100% sure family-less, friend-less humans.

So, you are asking us essentially what we prefer, to whack
a guy from the Bellagio poker room -or- torture six dogs.

That's not really a question.



[ QUOTE ]
You guys will be the death of me.

[/ QUOTE ]
I check this box.

[J. Stew]

Dogs are better manifestations of nature/life/god than humans are most of the time. Dogs are dumb and don't know to be anything different than dogs. Humans are smart and try to get famous so others will verify their existence. In this sense, dogs are true to themselves whereas people conjure up all sorts of ideas in their heads about who they are which is actually separate from reality and is not truth.

Dogs are balls of consciousness with hair and waggy tails. People are balls of consciousness with balding heads and clothes from the Gap. The only way dogs, or humans for that matter, get away from their natural selves is if they are abused or if they desire things apart from that which they already are. Dogs don't want anything but life and that which sustains it i.e. food, shelter . . . People eat, drink, want, in excess of what they need to sustain life.

If three dogs are tortured then there is a probability that one or all of the dogs will be scarred mentally for life which may separate them from their true selves that they are most likely in tune with already, granted no previous abuse and a generally normal life up till torture time. An example would be that the dog or dogs feels so much pain while being 'racked' that he/they remain in a state of fear for the rest of their lives. This would have reprocussions (sp?) not only in their own departure from their natural selves but exponentially in society when considering they will interact with many dogs for the rest of their lives and which their own negative mental state could prove infectious. Of course not to the same degree but low energy breeds low energy, that sort of thing. . . Anyways the negative effect on the dog or dogs' state of mind and the spread of hatred from that dog to other dogs, which would stem from the fear that the torturer instilled in said dog/dogs through torture, would outweigh the six hours of extra life the random human would get considering that the current average human state of mind is off in la la thought land and not here in the present moment where life is happening and dogs are pooping on their front lawns.

[Georgia Avenue]

[ QUOTE ]
Dogs are better manifestations of nature/life/god than humans are most of the time. Dogs are dumb and don't know to be anything different than dogs. Humans are smart and try to get famous so others will verify their existence. In this sense, dogs are true to themselves whereas people conjure up all sorts of ideas in their heads about who they are which is actually separate from reality and is not truth.


[/ QUOTE ]

POTW

I don't necessarily agree with the rest but...well-said anyway.

I'd kill the guy too.

[colgin]

[ QUOTE ]
You must check a box after which a random human will die six hours sooner than his time or three ownerless dogs will be excruciatingly tortured for a half an hour.


[/ QUOTE ]

David, I am not sure I have caught up on all the prior dog threads but I have read at least a few. In this hypo, in contrast to the others, I read it as the chooser now being the affirmative agent for shortening a human's life by 6 hours as opposed to, in the prior examples, failing to extend a person's life who was otherwise "scheduled" to die at an appointed time. Is that what you intended? If so, I see this as a very different situation than the earlier hypos.

[Piers]

No Idea.

Its not that you have judged it perfectly at one tortured dog equals two hours of human life.

The problem is that both events have such a low absolute value of importance to me, that just about any exterior factor favouring one of them will clinch the decision.

As to exact amount of human life a tortured dog is worth, I just don’t see the model the data would be a part of being much use.

I remember a while ago when Sklansky said in BIG CAPS that he was going somewhere with this.

I vote to kill the guy, no question. It is not even a close call when comparing just 6 hours of human life vs. three tortured dogs. I don't know how many hours you'd have to add until I'd change my vote. But it would be a lot more for me.

Sklansky, put all of us tortured dogs out of our misery soon and spill the beans on where you're going with this. I know with this much effort you've put in, it should be very interesting. At least I hope it is.

[hurlyburly]

Gotta side with the dogs. That box is the same as flipping the switch on the shock cage.

Then that gets me wondering who is flipping the switch on the torture and how this affects them, and I don't want to give someone who wants to torture dogs the opportunity or force someone who doesn't like doing that to do it.

[spaminator101]

I really do not see why you don't add polls to your dog and morality posts.

[NLSoldier]

I haven't read too many of the replies to these threads, but am I the only one that would torture any and all of the dogs in the world for 1 minute of human life?

[spaminator101]

Yes I think you are. /images/graemlins/grin.gif

I know every minute of Human Life is precious, however it is not going to change very much.

[housenuts]

you still can't torture the dogs. 6 hours in the grand scheme of things is nothing. and if you think about it, the last 6 hours of someone's life usually are pretty dull.

and because it's a random person this could mean a 32-year old father of 4 dies 6 hours ahead of his time. either way it's going to be a major shock. say he was due to get in a car crash and die a 7pm. wow!! everyone is shocked. but now instead of getting in the car crash on the way home, he gets in the crash on the way to the casino at 1pm. wow!! everyone is shocked just the same. there is no difference except that 3 dogs didn't get tortured.

[m1illion]

[ QUOTE ]
you still can't torture the dogs. 6 hours in the grand scheme of things is nothing. and if you think about it, the last 6 hours of someone's life usually are pretty dull.

and because it's a random person this could mean a 32-year old father of 4 dies 6 hours ahead of his time. either way it's going to be a major shock. say he was due to get in a car crash and die a 7pm. wow!! everyone is shocked. but now instead of getting in the car crash on the way home, he gets in the crash on the way to the casino at 1pm. wow!! everyone is shocked just the same. there is no difference except that 3 dogs didn't get tortured.

[/ QUOTE ]

or it could be the guy who was going to discover the cure for cancer but didn't.

[spaminator101]

Yes, or it could be the man who would cause WW3 but didn't.

[m1illion]

[ QUOTE ]
Yes, or it could be the man who would cause WW3 but didn't.

[/ QUOTE ]
And we can agree that no dog is likely to do either one?

[spaminator101]

No, I beleive Hitler's dog was responsable for WW2. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

You guys are all not looking deep enough.
I would definitely check the box for the dogs being tortured. And why is that? Well because the randomly selected human could be me.

If the option was "a randomly selected human, other than yourself", then I would certainly spare the dogs and strike down the human.

[Zeno]

Kill that human.

[ QUOTE ]
Almost There Dogwise

[/ QUOTE ]


When do we get to put these critters on the spit and have a feast?

I was thinking of starting a cannibalism post. I am getting tired of dog meat.

Or perhaps we could have a post about: child X lives or dies dependent on if dog A eats other child Y. Specific parameters to be set up only after a round of heavy drinking.

But cannibalism would be a better subject matter. I direct your attention to a delicious short story by Mark Twain: Cannibalism in the Cars (http://www.hannibal.net/twain/works/cannibalism_in_cars_1875/). Perhaps this will provide some inspiration.

Le Misanthrope

[PokerAmateur4]

Well, the only criterion I could make for a choice which seems reasonable is that:

I am an animal, I know that I don't like suffering.

A dog is an animal, I can extend compassion/empathy to this creature and don't want it to hurt.

I don't know what effect dieing 6 hours before one's time, but my guess is none noticable to the person in question, they are dead, right?

Save the pups from anguish.