I think the trolly problem, while very interesting, doesn't really say anything about mortality. Rather it tells us about the wiring of our brains. We have some hard-coded rules for judging morality which evolved before we had things like trolleys, so when presented with the problem we experience a brain fart (more scientifically known as a "cognitive bias") which doesn't really mesh with the reality of the situation. There is functionally zero difference between pushing the fat man onto the tracks or pulling the lever, so there should be no differentiation as far as morality is concerned.
Anyone have a suggestion how we might quantify our moral intuitions on this question?
I wouldn't worry about the moral intuitions; morality is complex enough without bringing intuition into it. In many cases it's not a clear cut case of one action being moral and another being immoral; rather it's different shades of morality. In the trolley problem, it's not immoral for you to NOT pull the lever, and it's not immoral to pull it, either. Which action is MORE moral depends very much on what model of morality you accept. If your definition of morality hinges on not violating the liberty/consent of another human being, then not pulling it is more moral (you're probably a Quaker, or a pacifist). If, on the other hand, your concept of morality is based on reducing harm and suffering as much as possible, then pulling it is more moral (you're probably Sam Harris).
Which model is better... that's the real question. It has yet to be conclusively answered. But regardless of which model you subscribe to, a case like chopping up people to provide organs for others is generally seen as immoral. In the consent-based morality model it's pretty clear why this would be the case. Under the harm-reduction morality model it's more difficult to see why it would be immoral, but the big concern is downstream effects. None of us would want to live in a society where we might be randomly chopped up for spare parts, even if it means that we will have a plentiful supply of parts when we ourselves need them. So while having such a "donation" model might reduce harm in one area, the effect it would have on the population as a whole would be far more detrimental than the benefits gained.
I wrote a detailed response but Slashdot ate it, so I'll try again and be a bit more brief:
1. Your source lists pretty much everything as being between 100% and 400% more expensive in Chicago. This means that the $10 Bucharest plan should be somewhere between $20 and $40 in Chicago.
2. Population density makes a big difference, with Romania as a whole being about 3 times more dense than the USA. Canada (my country) has the same issue. Our prices are comparable to the USA despite the fact that we have more competition between broadband providers. The problem is that heavily dense areas like Toronto have to subsidize rural areas like my city. So I pay the same amount for internet access as someone in Toronto despite the fact that it's far more expensive to provide it out here.
Once we account for the fact that everything is much cheaper in your nation, AND that people live much closer together, much of the "mystery" over the price difference disappears. Maybe there's still some room left over to squeeze your "competition" argument in there, but competition is just one small factor in the final price difference.
(and yes, I do agree that competition is important, but, for the last time, it plays a much lesser role than things like overall national economic state, population density, and legislation/regulatory hurdles)
It's stupid. I can call you a dick, a cunt, an asshole, a fuckwit, a retard, a moron, an imbecile, a douchebag, a jackass, or a buffoon, and that's all perfectly acceptable and not hate speech. But I can't call you a n*gger or a f*ggot, because hate speech. But you can call me a cracker or a breeder, because hand waving.
Who the fuck makes up this bullshit? Idiots with too much time on their hands and an IQ smaller than their waist band.
Couldn't you just drop in a button that links to the payment API and hide it somewhere unobtrusive like the "about" menu? Nobody will ever use it but that's kinda the point, right?
I'm not an app developer but I don't see why this would take months of development. Seems like it shouldn't take more than a couple hours tops.
(also please note that I'm not defending apple; they're obviously being dicks)
So what kind of drive system is this? Ion drive? 'Cause those don't go fast, and will never provide enough propulsion to get you off of the planet.
Either a nuclear thermal rocket, or something like Project Orion where you literally blow up hundreds of (small) nukes behind your spaceships.
Ion propulsion would work too, but would only really be useful for really long distances.
Of the three, only a nuclear thermal rocket could really be used inside earths atmosphere (Orion could have been also, back when we didnt think twice about testing nukes all over the place. But people are a little more picky about radiation these days).
There are better ways to get thrust using nuclear power than what Project Orion wanted to do, and the US was actually pursuing some of them. Project Rover took place at Los Alamos for about 2 decades starting in the 50s, and showed that nuclear thermal rockets were possible and had a lot of potential.
The other option would be Ion Propulsion using a nuclear reactor as the power source. While acceleration would be slow it would also be the most propellant-efficient method we currently have, and would be great for long duration missions.
Of course if we are just talking about going to Mars on a regular basis, we don't really need nuclear anything. The best solution is a "cycler". Basically a very large ship or station in a permanent orbit which brings it near Earth and Mars on a regular basis. You only have to accelerate it up to speed once; after that you just send smaller shuttles to meet up with and transfer people/cargo every time it comes near you, with more shuttles meeting it on the other end to unload.
Firing is a legitimate part of legitimate ostracism. Nobody wants you ariund, so they avoid you; when you muscle or swindle your way in anyway, they kick you out. As long as the ostracism itself is legitimate -i.e. based on what you do, not who you are- then so are the firings.
That's just dressing up bigotry to make it sound more appealing. It's like religious fundamentalists saying "it's not a sin to be gay, but it's a sin for a man to have sex with another man". See? They're not ostracising you for who you ARE, they're ostracising you for what you DO. You can be a homosexual all you like, just don't be doing none of that gay sex stuff!
It's a shitty differentiation on the face of it but, more importantly, it opens up the door to all kinds of discrimination which should not fly in any civilized society. By your logic it should be perfectly fine for a business to fire a woman who has an abortion, or a man who prays to the "wrong" god, or anyone who speaks favourably about socialism/anarchism/capitalism or any other topic whatsoever. In times past you would have successfully argued that it's perfectly fine to ostracize and fire any woman who speaks up in favour of women's suffrage.
We can certainly discuss whether or not such firings should be legal and, even though most societies have generally agreed that it shouldn't, you might be able to present a good argument for allowing it. But regardless of whether or not it should be legal there's very little doubt that in many cases it is wrong, and actively detrimental to the growth of an egalitarian society. Firing people for having or espousing unpopular opinions is only slightly less harmful than just outright criminalising the expression of those opinions.
That's all without even considering the phenomenon of demonizing people who espouse anything which even mildly questions the prevailing orthodoxy, assigning views and categories to them which they do not hold, and then ostracising and/or firing them for apparently being (or doing) the caricature which you've created. James Damore wasn't fired because he did anything actually objectionable; he was fired because the SJWs painted him as a horrible sexist Nazi who just wants to oppress women and is "creating a hostile environment" for women at google. All of which was utter bullshit, but since when has any witch hunt needed an actual witch?
In response to your question, you don't even need to dig through any contracts to see details on throttling policies. You get the info up front on the page advertising their plans:
Unlimited Plans 4G LTE only. During times of congestion, your data may be temporarily slower than other traffic (only after 22GB/mo on Beyond Unlimited or 75 GB/mo on Above Unlimited). Not available for machine-to-machine services. Mobile hotspot/tethering reduced to speeds up to 600Kbps (only after 15GB/mo on Beyond Unlimited or 20 GB/mo on Above Unlimited)
It's not as if this is some secret. The exact criteria for throttling will depend on which specific plan they were on (and since nobody has provided that info we can only speculate based on some of the details they provided) but every single one of the "unlimited" plans stipulates the right to engage in throttling at some point. In fact given that the fire department acknowledges paying only $37 per month for the plan, it seems like their data limit should have been much lower. The above page states throttling starts at 20gb on the "above unlimited" plan; a plan which costs $60 per month.
Bucharest is the capital of the nation. Can you imagine paying $50,000 for an apartment in Washington DC?
Really it's worse than that because, AFAIK, Bucharest is also the most expensive place in the nation for housing, whereas Washington is merely average for the US. Try getting an apartment in NYC for $50k, where the median condo price is $690,000.
You live in a poor nation with one of the lowest costs of living in the world. I'm sure that competition between ISPs doesn't hurt, but there are a fuck of a lot of other factors which explain the price difference far better.
more and more we're finding that people's failings aren't their own
Really? Whose are they, then?
You are not some magical entity that's separate from your body. You are the sum total of all of your parts. "It's not my fault, it's my body" is a nonsensical statement.
It's "unlimited" but subject to throttling over 25 gigs, as spelled out in the contract. If they wanted no throttling they should have bought a different plan.
The only thing Verizon has stated is that they will generally lift those throttling restrictions when the fire department calls them and says they need data for emergency use. Verizon doesn't "monitor" it, they just try to help out when emergency services specifically request it.
You're right, Verizon SHOULDN'T have to monitor it; the fire department should just buy a plan that actually satisfies their needs.
The real solution (one that I think is already being used) - is quantum entangled communication.
The problem with quantum entangled communication is that it requires cold fusion reactors to power it. Otherwise it doesn't have enough energy to travel through the ether.
Verizon has stated that in those situations they have a policy of doing whatever it takes to restore service and then worrying about the billing later. Apparently the "sales drone" wasn't aware of that or something.
On the other hand, given that it apparently WAS an emergency, you would think the fire department would likewise have a "just get it done" policy where any rookie calling in should be able to say "yes, sure, bill us the extra $2, just get the service restored NOW". Which is what he should have done. The fact that he didn't suggests to me that either it wasn't really much of an emergency, or he was so scared shirtless of the bean-counters that he was willing to risk lives rather than possibly get reprimanded for spending $2 without authorisation.
And more importantly, my principle also supports Vulcan morality: The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.
Agreed, which is why we should have a mandatory random lottery every day, the "winner" of which gets chopped up to provide organs for the people on donation waiting lists. After all, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one.
That comparison is way off the mark. Guns don't do anything on their own. Facebook does a fuck of a lot on it's own. It's designed to feed you whatever propaganda you're most predisposed to believing.
Facebook is pretty much the best brainwashing machine ever built, so yeah, it shares a large chunk of the blame. Obviously the people who engage in violence aren't innocent cherubs, but their individual actions are a much smaller problem.
Amos-6 went from nothing to an explosion, with shrapnel, directly under the payload.
There isn't much in the way of shrapnel to worry about. The majority of the force of the explosion is going sideways, and taking most of the rocket fragments with it. The bit of "shrapnel" being directed upwards is likely just large chunks of the end-cap of the stage, and they're being pushed at relatively low speeds compared to shrapnel propelled by an actual explosive.
But you'd need to react in 3 secs or you'll be pointing in the wrong direction for it to have any hope.
Any decent automated escape system would be able to react in a fraction of a second. Even if you were silly enough to leave it up to a human, a well trained pilot would react in a second or so.
Also escape systems don't care much about what direction you're pointed in; even ejection seats in fighter jets have automatic systems to detect orientation and steer the seat in the desired direction. As long as you're not inverted and very low to the ground, you'll be OK. There's a great video online of a Canadian F-18 pilot ejecting from an aircraft which was on the ground but had begun to tip over; he ejects sideways but the seat quickly turns and rockets upwards. (Amusingly enough, the force of the ejection also pushes the F-18 sideways and stops it from tipping. The "dashcam" video shows the plane rolling to a perfect stop as the pilot thunders down onto the ground in front of it.)
They tried to help. They offered to upgrade the plan for an extra $2 per month. Apparently the fire guy calling them couldn't authorize that upgrade for some fucked up reason.
I don't have any problems with preferential voting, nor am I claiming that the electoral college model is inherently the best system. Just pointing out that, were the US to get rid of the electoral college and make no other changes, things would be worse rather than better.
Slashdot Mirror
I think the trolly problem, while very interesting, doesn't really say anything about mortality. Rather it tells us about the wiring of our brains. We have some hard-coded rules for judging morality which evolved before we had things like trolleys, so when presented with the problem we experience a brain fart (more scientifically known as a "cognitive bias") which doesn't really mesh with the reality of the situation. There is functionally zero difference between pushing the fat man onto the tracks or pulling the lever, so there should be no differentiation as far as morality is concerned.
Anyone have a suggestion how we might quantify our moral intuitions on this question?
I wouldn't worry about the moral intuitions; morality is complex enough without bringing intuition into it. In many cases it's not a clear cut case of one action being moral and another being immoral; rather it's different shades of morality. In the trolley problem, it's not immoral for you to NOT pull the lever, and it's not immoral to pull it, either. Which action is MORE moral depends very much on what model of morality you accept. If your definition of morality hinges on not violating the liberty/consent of another human being, then not pulling it is more moral (you're probably a Quaker, or a pacifist). If, on the other hand, your concept of morality is based on reducing harm and suffering as much as possible, then pulling it is more moral (you're probably Sam Harris).
Which model is better ... that's the real question. It has yet to be conclusively answered. But regardless of which model you subscribe to, a case like chopping up people to provide organs for others is generally seen as immoral. In the consent-based morality model it's pretty clear why this would be the case. Under the harm-reduction morality model it's more difficult to see why it would be immoral, but the big concern is downstream effects. None of us would want to live in a society where we might be randomly chopped up for spare parts, even if it means that we will have a plentiful supply of parts when we ourselves need them. So while having such a "donation" model might reduce harm in one area, the effect it would have on the population as a whole would be far more detrimental than the benefits gained.
Like I said ... it's complicated.
I wrote a detailed response but Slashdot ate it, so I'll try again and be a bit more brief:
1. Your source lists pretty much everything as being between 100% and 400% more expensive in Chicago. This means that the $10 Bucharest plan should be somewhere between $20 and $40 in Chicago.
2. Population density makes a big difference, with Romania as a whole being about 3 times more dense than the USA. Canada (my country) has the same issue. Our prices are comparable to the USA despite the fact that we have more competition between broadband providers. The problem is that heavily dense areas like Toronto have to subsidize rural areas like my city. So I pay the same amount for internet access as someone in Toronto despite the fact that it's far more expensive to provide it out here.
Once we account for the fact that everything is much cheaper in your nation, AND that people live much closer together, much of the "mystery" over the price difference disappears. Maybe there's still some room left over to squeeze your "competition" argument in there, but competition is just one small factor in the final price difference.
(and yes, I do agree that competition is important, but, for the last time, it plays a much lesser role than things like overall national economic state, population density, and legislation/regulatory hurdles)
It's stupid. I can call you a dick, a cunt, an asshole, a fuckwit, a retard, a moron, an imbecile, a douchebag, a jackass, or a buffoon, and that's all perfectly acceptable and not hate speech. But I can't call you a n*gger or a f*ggot, because hate speech. But you can call me a cracker or a breeder, because hand waving.
Who the fuck makes up this bullshit? Idiots with too much time on their hands and an IQ smaller than their waist band.
That's not indecent, it's just retarded.
Couldn't you just drop in a button that links to the payment API and hide it somewhere unobtrusive like the "about" menu? Nobody will ever use it but that's kinda the point, right?
I'm not an app developer but I don't see why this would take months of development. Seems like it shouldn't take more than a couple hours tops.
(also please note that I'm not defending apple; they're obviously being dicks)
So what kind of drive system is this? Ion drive? 'Cause those don't go fast, and will never provide enough propulsion to get you off of the planet.
Either a nuclear thermal rocket, or something like Project Orion where you literally blow up hundreds of (small) nukes behind your spaceships.
Ion propulsion would work too, but would only really be useful for really long distances.
Of the three, only a nuclear thermal rocket could really be used inside earths atmosphere (Orion could have been also, back when we didnt think twice about testing nukes all over the place. But people are a little more picky about radiation these days).
There are better ways to get thrust using nuclear power than what Project Orion wanted to do, and the US was actually pursuing some of them. Project Rover took place at Los Alamos for about 2 decades starting in the 50s, and showed that nuclear thermal rockets were possible and had a lot of potential.
The other option would be Ion Propulsion using a nuclear reactor as the power source. While acceleration would be slow it would also be the most propellant-efficient method we currently have, and would be great for long duration missions.
Of course if we are just talking about going to Mars on a regular basis, we don't really need nuclear anything. The best solution is a "cycler". Basically a very large ship or station in a permanent orbit which brings it near Earth and Mars on a regular basis. You only have to accelerate it up to speed once; after that you just send smaller shuttles to meet up with and transfer people/cargo every time it comes near you, with more shuttles meeting it on the other end to unload.
Firing is a legitimate part of legitimate ostracism. Nobody wants you ariund, so they avoid you; when you muscle or swindle your way in anyway, they kick you out. As long as the ostracism itself is legitimate -i.e. based on what you do, not who you are- then so are the firings.
That's just dressing up bigotry to make it sound more appealing. It's like religious fundamentalists saying "it's not a sin to be gay, but it's a sin for a man to have sex with another man". See? They're not ostracising you for who you ARE, they're ostracising you for what you DO. You can be a homosexual all you like, just don't be doing none of that gay sex stuff!
It's a shitty differentiation on the face of it but, more importantly, it opens up the door to all kinds of discrimination which should not fly in any civilized society. By your logic it should be perfectly fine for a business to fire a woman who has an abortion, or a man who prays to the "wrong" god, or anyone who speaks favourably about socialism/anarchism/capitalism or any other topic whatsoever. In times past you would have successfully argued that it's perfectly fine to ostracize and fire any woman who speaks up in favour of women's suffrage.
We can certainly discuss whether or not such firings should be legal and, even though most societies have generally agreed that it shouldn't, you might be able to present a good argument for allowing it. But regardless of whether or not it should be legal there's very little doubt that in many cases it is wrong, and actively detrimental to the growth of an egalitarian society. Firing people for having or espousing unpopular opinions is only slightly less harmful than just outright criminalising the expression of those opinions.
That's all without even considering the phenomenon of demonizing people who espouse anything which even mildly questions the prevailing orthodoxy, assigning views and categories to them which they do not hold, and then ostracising and/or firing them for apparently being (or doing) the caricature which you've created. James Damore wasn't fired because he did anything actually objectionable; he was fired because the SJWs painted him as a horrible sexist Nazi who just wants to oppress women and is "creating a hostile environment" for women at google. All of which was utter bullshit, but since when has any witch hunt needed an actual witch?
Ok, so you are just making it up. Good to know.
In response to your question, you don't even need to dig through any contracts to see details on throttling policies. You get the info up front on the page advertising their plans:
Unlimited Plans
4G LTE only. During times of congestion, your data may be temporarily slower than other traffic (only after 22GB/mo on Beyond Unlimited or 75 GB/mo on Above Unlimited). Not available for machine-to-machine services. Mobile hotspot/tethering reduced to speeds up to 600Kbps (only after 15GB/mo on Beyond Unlimited or 20 GB/mo on Above Unlimited)
https://www.verizonwireless.co...
It's not as if this is some secret. The exact criteria for throttling will depend on which specific plan they were on (and since nobody has provided that info we can only speculate based on some of the details they provided) but every single one of the "unlimited" plans stipulates the right to engage in throttling at some point. In fact given that the fire department acknowledges paying only $37 per month for the plan, it seems like their data limit should have been much lower. The above page states throttling starts at 20gb on the "above unlimited" plan; a plan which costs $60 per month.
Bucharest is the capital of the nation. Can you imagine paying $50,000 for an apartment in Washington DC?
Really it's worse than that because, AFAIK, Bucharest is also the most expensive place in the nation for housing, whereas Washington is merely average for the US. Try getting an apartment in NYC for $50k, where the median condo price is $690,000.
You live in a poor nation with one of the lowest costs of living in the world. I'm sure that competition between ISPs doesn't hurt, but there are a fuck of a lot of other factors which explain the price difference far better.
I suspect you're just making that up but, please, go ahead and provide an excerpt of the relevant part of the contract.
more and more we're finding that people's failings aren't their own
Really? Whose are they, then?
You are not some magical entity that's separate from your body. You are the sum total of all of your parts. "It's not my fault, it's my body" is a nonsensical statement.
It's "unlimited" but subject to throttling over 25 gigs, as spelled out in the contract. If they wanted no throttling they should have bought a different plan.
The only thing Verizon has stated is that they will generally lift those throttling restrictions when the fire department calls them and says they need data for emergency use. Verizon doesn't "monitor" it, they just try to help out when emergency services specifically request it.
You're right, Verizon SHOULDN'T have to monitor it; the fire department should just buy a plan that actually satisfies their needs.
So, if they provide these same level of service to both firefighters and to regular citizens, that's not neutral?
I think you're very confused.
Well, to be fair, your house cost $20,000 and your "wife" is only $10 a day. Weird how a third world country can allow that to happen.
Amazingly enough you are correct for once, if only by accident. They actually had the $37 plan which, as you rightly point out, is not $40.
This message brought to you by the Communist Party of China.
The real solution (one that I think is already being used) - is quantum entangled communication.
The problem with quantum entangled communication is that it requires cold fusion reactors to power it. Otherwise it doesn't have enough energy to travel through the ether.
Verizon has stated that in those situations they have a policy of doing whatever it takes to restore service and then worrying about the billing later. Apparently the "sales drone" wasn't aware of that or something.
On the other hand, given that it apparently WAS an emergency, you would think the fire department would likewise have a "just get it done" policy where any rookie calling in should be able to say "yes, sure, bill us the extra $2, just get the service restored NOW". Which is what he should have done. The fact that he didn't suggests to me that either it wasn't really much of an emergency, or he was so scared shirtless of the bean-counters that he was willing to risk lives rather than possibly get reprimanded for spending $2 without authorisation.
And more importantly, my principle also supports Vulcan morality: The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.
Agreed, which is why we should have a mandatory random lottery every day, the "winner" of which gets chopped up to provide organs for the people on donation waiting lists. After all, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one.
That comparison is way off the mark. Guns don't do anything on their own. Facebook does a fuck of a lot on it's own. It's designed to feed you whatever propaganda you're most predisposed to believing.
Facebook is pretty much the best brainwashing machine ever built, so yeah, it shares a large chunk of the blame. Obviously the people who engage in violence aren't innocent cherubs, but their individual actions are a much smaller problem.
You just keep failing again, and again, and again ...
https://travel.state.gov/conte...
Amos-6 went from nothing to an explosion, with shrapnel, directly under the payload.
There isn't much in the way of shrapnel to worry about. The majority of the force of the explosion is going sideways, and taking most of the rocket fragments with it. The bit of "shrapnel" being directed upwards is likely just large chunks of the end-cap of the stage, and they're being pushed at relatively low speeds compared to shrapnel propelled by an actual explosive.
But you'd need to react in 3 secs or you'll be pointing in the wrong direction for it to have any hope.
Any decent automated escape system would be able to react in a fraction of a second. Even if you were silly enough to leave it up to a human, a well trained pilot would react in a second or so.
Also escape systems don't care much about what direction you're pointed in; even ejection seats in fighter jets have automatic systems to detect orientation and steer the seat in the desired direction. As long as you're not inverted and very low to the ground, you'll be OK. There's a great video online of a Canadian F-18 pilot ejecting from an aircraft which was on the ground but had begun to tip over; he ejects sideways but the seat quickly turns and rockets upwards. (Amusingly enough, the force of the ejection also pushes the F-18 sideways and stops it from tipping. The "dashcam" video shows the plane rolling to a perfect stop as the pilot thunders down onto the ground in front of it.)
They tried to help. They offered to upgrade the plan for an extra $2 per month. Apparently the fire guy calling them couldn't authorize that upgrade for some fucked up reason.
I don't have any problems with preferential voting, nor am I claiming that the electoral college model is inherently the best system. Just pointing out that, were the US to get rid of the electoral college and make no other changes, things would be worse rather than better.