From: Lee Corbin (lcorbin@tsoft.com)
Date: Thu Sep 19 2002 - 18:59:32 MDT
Gordon writes
> Lee Corbin wrote:
>
> > Probably not "drive to live". Marvin Minsky somewhat famously
> > pointed out that we do not have an instinct to avoid death. The
> > point, as I recall, was that we have instinctual urges to avoid
> > pain and so on, but that death was too recent a concept.
>
> Okay, I will again for a second time adjust my terms to suit you: it's
> my contention that you have as part of your person-hood a deep-seated
> drive to avoid the great pain and discomfort that you will feel should
> your brain and vital organs be deprived of oxygen. Better?
"Part of what makes me a person is a deep-seated drive
to avoid the pain should my organs be deprived of oxygen."
(I had to write that just to focus; on each of three consecutive
prior readings your paragraph, I kept getting opposite answers!)
I agree with my paraphrase, at least. I agree with it because
it can be said that I am driven to avoid pain. Hence, logically,
I should agree to "I have a drive to avoid pain". This does
occur, your Honor, both at the conscious and unconscious levels.
I will pay $10 to avoid getting punched in the jaw next December,
and, when asleep will probably move away from some painful
objects without becoming conscious.
But it's not *me* when it's unconscious. That's a reflex that
I may choose to edit out of myself when I reach a time of good
technology.
> My main thrust in this argument, which you seem to want to avoid, is
> that internal behaviors like breathing and the beating of the heart are
> controlled by primitive drives or motivations (whichever word you
> prefer), and that these basic drives or motivations are part of YOU.
> They are not of some other.
I say that they are *not* part of me. Now fending off pain
is a part of me, but *not* these "internal behaviors", I claim.
> To me the above is an obvious truth of human nature. I find myself
> wondering why it should even be a topic of debate.
I sense some exasperation on your part, which is quite
understandable. My guess is that our differences don't
lie near the surface of our belief systems within easy
access, but are deeply hidden. Moreover, it really is
very *hard*, even though we are both intelligent, to
even *remember* that the other person has such an alien
concept of ... whatever.
If I am correct, then you may have thought yourself close
to crossing the last t and dotting the last i, only to
have the victory keep slipping away. Sorry to get into
this "head" stuff, but it's rampant in a major thread
going on as I think you know; and perhaps not, it seems,
irrelevant. After all, above you did note (though in not
a nasty way) that I seemed to be almost purposely avoiding
your main thrust. So far as I know, that was not
intentional ;-)
We each have this big semantic web full of all these concepts
and words. We have already seen that our difficulty with
*altruism* could be traced, perhaps, to our difficulty with
*motivation*, and that is now traced, perhaps, to what "you"
means and perhaps even what is meant by "drive".
I don't have any particular sense that we are nearly done.
I think that what will happen is that at some point you will
go away and slowly open up to the transhumanist concept of
uploading, and I'll go away slowly opening up to the notion
that the little "satisfaction" in the brain ought to be
regarded as *reward experience*, and that the martyr could
be seen as acting to increment his reward experience.
But we're not there yet ;-)
> >> I replied by challenging anyone to show me a single person in this
> >> world who acts altruistically and who does not do so because it
> >> makes him feel good to do so.
> >
> > And of course, we had our example of the fanatic sacrificing
> > himself at the clear and ongoing cost of great pain (as in
> > the above mentioned paragraph).
>
> And that fanatic does not act in violation of the principle I am
> espousing, except in your imagination. :)
>
> The terrorist fanatic sacrifices himself because it is to him a great
> glory to do so for the sake of his party/country/religion/whatever. He
> will even tell you beforehand that this is his motivation! To him, his
> sacrificial act will be perhaps the most rewarding experience of his
> life.
I don't have an argument with the way that you've phrased
the incident. If the fanatic has told himself for hours
on end how wonderful it will be to destroy the towers,
then, yes, you could argue that as a machine he's getting
joy out of that, and that that is the best explanation of
his action.
Here is a slightly different take on the thought-experiment,
and it differs in emphasis from your description of the
earlier one. Suppose that a man who loves his family
more than anything is suddenly confronted with a boiling
liquid (which has already started to scald him). He knows
that his family will die if he does not plunge his hand
in, and that moreover, he will absolutely die right now
unless he runs away. So he plunges his hand in, and the
boiling acid not only kills him but does so painfully over
a few minutes. Explain again how he's doing this for the
"reward experience"?
> >> I think honest altruists are completely aware of their real
> >> motivations for doing good. They will tell you they like to
> >> help others because they
> >> find it to be a rewarding experience.
> >
> > Oh, no doubt. This is indeed *often* a factor, even a big
> > factor. But I don't think it exclusive.
>
> Please describe an example of an act of sincere altruism that is not
> accompanied by and motivated by the sense of satisfaction that comes
> from acting for the benefit of others.
In my example above, there is a curious feature, that was
also present in yours. In each case, notice that to some
extent the man is pre-programmed?
> Show me someone who acts altruistically but feels no
> satisfaction from it and I will show you someone who
> was coerced into helping others and who was thus was
> not truly acting altruistically in the first place.
Well, I would say the man above who saved his family.
He doesn't even get the satisfaction of knowing that
his family is safe (say). So you are talking about
some fleeting moment during the instant it takes him
to plunge his hand into the boiling acid. Still
sounds like a stretch to me.
> I'm cutting this short because of time restraints
> I am faced with today.
Well, if it's not one of us, then it's the other! :-)
Just when finally for an evening I have some free
time.
Yours,
Lee
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