Discussion A values proposition. (long post, lmk if posted in wrong place, new member, etc.)

[NowhereCabin]

I wish that people understood matters of life and death as what they are-- a values proposition. Are there plenty of people around who are having a good time and living largely without a tinge of dread about that good time ending (mistakenly or not), especially if signs point to that trend continuing? Absolutely! And it makes sense for them to have continuing to enjoy themselves be higher up on their priority list than the absolute and perfect neutrality (for lack of a better term) of nonexistence.

If, on the other hand, things are decidedly unpleasant and signs point to that trend continuing for an extended period, especially to the point it can be reasonably predicted that any pleasantries potentially forthcoming may be outweighed by the existential price of admission (the predicted comparative value of those positive experiences to that of the negative ones), then it would make sense for people to permanently opt out of that negative predicted trend, placing the "neutrality" of not being (depending on your belief system about existence post-mortem) as a higher priority than the net negative experience of continued struggling. Getting out while the getting's good (or at least not as bad), as it were. Like selling off your stocks before they lose their value so you don't end up operating at a loss.

Of course, people all have their different values and tolerances, and someone in the position of one guy might be significantly more satisfied in that specific situation than he would be in his own, and vice versa. The same thing can be valued differently by different people because people have differing tastes, after all. So any claims of one having things "better" or "worse" than anyone else is purely subjective, and is no one else's place to decide.

Only you can decide the value of any individual thing to you, and the subjective experience of your existence is simply the sum of all of those things, making its value only yours to decide as well.

People can judge anyone else all they want, but its not going to change A) people's experiences, be them good or bad, or B) what good or bad even mean in that context to anyone else. People shouldn't have to have their lives (and in particular, deaths) be regulated based on the value other people ascribe to them, and your autonomy shouldn't have to depend on random groups of people in high places just happening to have values (or an order of priorities) similar enough to your own for you to align with what they (arbitrarily) believe constitutes personhood.

Uhh, I have no idea if this is even remotely llegible. This wholeass wall was just me raving and carrying on like a madman, and I have no idea if I'm even posting in the right forum (as opposed to the politics and philosophy subforum). It was originally gonna be a reply in a different thread but then it got WAY too long. If people want to ask questions for the sake of being able to actually read what the hell any of this rambling wall was supposed to even be then uh... yeah. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk ig HDKWJESSKKAKDBSJS (edits bc I live in typo hell)

 

[Argo]

I love these kinds of posts(both reading and writing) so I have to respond. My hot take is I actually don't think values are a subjective problem. Subjects have values, yes, and different subjects have wildly differing values, also yes, but I don't think value boils down to mere opinion. Value boils down to a large complexity of facts about what we're talking about. In other words, I think one can have the wrong values. This is in easy cases, something like... suppose you were on a diet, and said your highest value was losing weight. But then you ate 1,500 surplus calories every day. Assuming you *actually* say what you mean and you truly do value losing weight, how much you value all that extra food is just an objectively wrong conflict. This person is basically confused.

In the same way, I think ethics are purely a question of facts. Example: "Is our world, an ethical world, or an unethical world?" There's an actual objective answer to this question that can be found even if the question is much more nuanced than it presents to be. And if the answer is, "Our world is a perfect heaven", then that answer is almost certainly objectively wrong unless we're horribly confused in every way possible. Because you don't need to be a genius to just, at least in principle, imagine a world with half of the torture and abuse and suffering our world has, and say: "Look, here's a way more ethical world".

The way I deal with someone saying: " Well actually, according to my subjective preferences and values, a way more ethical world would be one where we torture and abuse everything twice as much, rather than half as much. You see, I really get off on seeing people suffer" is call them a psychopath and disqualify them from the conversation(the same way you'd disqualify a toddler who can't keep the chess pieces out of their mouth from a Master+ Chess tournament). This is really the only option when one plays epistemological games that don't actually have an honest endgame. (philosophy is unfortunately full of this shit and this is why almost everyone on Earth hates philosophy)

So to bring this back to your post, I think the people living "the good life" you refer to, are actually confused. They value life, but they are not quite in touch with reality as a function of living the good life. Where as, those living the bad life, while they are certainly lacking in experience, they have a certain asymmetrical sobriety to the nature of things that those living the good life really do lack. To me, it's not "okay well I like chocolate, you like vanilla, I guess we agree to disagree". It's "This world is factually a hellish world, and you are confused, and your values perpetuate certain hellish features, as a function of ignorance, a lack of experience, empathy, insight, and so on"

 

[Slow_Farewell]

I agree with your post. and yeah I can follow it, and yes, I agree the value we place on each of our lives is subjective.