There are many reasons why a person would do that.
I can tell you that when you're married or have people that depend on you, the equation DRASTICALLY changes.
In fact it changes so much that if God came down and said... well this sucks but I'm giving you a choice: you and your family and 3 of your favorite friends will be saved but EVERYONE in the world dies, horribly painfully - OR - if you chose to not go that route, YOU and your family will die. You have 1 minute to decide.
I know what most people would choose to kill everyone else.
Something that often isn't brought up in these arguments is that the utility of any organism isn't linear with the number of organisms.
10^100 shrimp is like many planets worth of life, but if it's all the same type of shrimp then what does it matter. I certainly would sacrifice a person for TWO shrimp if they were the last two shrimp on earth.
I would not do that for two shrimp, since it is highly likely that those last two will not be successful in creating more.
It is also VERY likely that if we're down to two shrimp that a reasonably high number of people will have already died because for that scenario to exists (suddenly) there will be a lot of suicide, but moreso many other lifeforms in the ocean will die off fairly quickly as the ecosystem would have changed instantly.
I would be more willing to sacrifice a person at random than myself.
I also didn't say that the ecosystem necessarily had to change instantly. It could even be two sexed organisms of a completely novel species that the ecosystem doesn't rely on.
And is it nessisarially true that people would be commiting suicide if there was a major ecological catastrophe like that? Life goes on, people have it within them the will to find a way to survive. I think it would just look like blade runner 2077 where people are surviving off of bugs and tofu.
Most people in america don't seem to complain about the artificial food now (impossible burgers, HFCS, really most processed food comes to mind).
There are many reasons why a person would do that.
I can tell you that when you're married or have people that depend on you, the equation DRASTICALLY changes.
In fact it changes so much that if God came down and said... well this sucks but I'm giving you a choice: you and your family and 3 of your favorite friends will be saved but EVERYONE in the world dies, horribly painfully - OR - if you chose to not go that route, YOU and your family will die. You have 1 minute to decide.
I know what most people would choose to kill everyone else.
But yeah, there's always a few
Something that often isn't brought up in these arguments is that the utility of any organism isn't linear with the number of organisms.
10^100 shrimp is like many planets worth of life, but if it's all the same type of shrimp then what does it matter. I certainly would sacrifice a person for TWO shrimp if they were the last two shrimp on earth.
Would you do that if the person was random?
I would not do that for two shrimp, since it is highly likely that those last two will not be successful in creating more.
It is also VERY likely that if we're down to two shrimp that a reasonably high number of people will have already died because for that scenario to exists (suddenly) there will be a lot of suicide, but moreso many other lifeforms in the ocean will die off fairly quickly as the ecosystem would have changed instantly.
I would be more willing to sacrifice a person at random than myself.
I also didn't say that the ecosystem necessarily had to change instantly. It could even be two sexed organisms of a completely novel species that the ecosystem doesn't rely on.
And is it nessisarially true that people would be commiting suicide if there was a major ecological catastrophe like that? Life goes on, people have it within them the will to find a way to survive. I think it would just look like blade runner 2077 where people are surviving off of bugs and tofu.
Most people in america don't seem to complain about the artificial food now (impossible burgers, HFCS, really most processed food comes to mind).
> 10^100 shrimp is like many planets worth of life
If each electron in the universe contained as many shrimp as there are grains of sand on Earth, that would be approximately 10^100 shrimp.