Talking with David Pearce on Twitter
This is a collection of twitter discussions with David Pearce. He is a hedonic utilitarian, essentially, and he takes that position to an extreme conclusion: that life should be re-engineered to eliminate suffering, so that behavior is driven by “gradients of bliss”. We have debated various issues on Twitter. The threads included here mostly involve questions of morality and/or individual purpose. Some involve his belief that altruistic morality is implied by scientific rationalism. As you can see, he tends to abort the discussion when he reaches the limits of his own thought. If I question one of his core assumptions, or point out a fallacy in his thought, he terminates the discussion. This is pretty typical. However, he is willing to have discussions with people that he doesn’t agree with, so he is more open to rational discourse than most people on Twitter. List of threads: Let’s aspire to impartial benevolence towards all sentient beings. Hedonic wealt...