Posted: Jun 12, 2011 12:45 am
Yes my terminology was a bit loose there. I was aware of that as I wrote it, but couldn't be bothered doing the extra typing to state the thought more clearly - and got called out on it!Paul Almond wrote:andrewk wrote:I find every-world hypotheses, whether in the quantum-mechanics based form or any other, somewhat morally disheartening. If whenever faced with a moral decision I believe that, regardless of what choice I make, there will always be just as many worlds in which I make the immoral decision, it seems to make it pointless to weigh up ethical choices. In short, there is nothing I can do to make the totality of all worlds any better.
But it doesn't actually say that - some things would occur in more worlds than others.
What I was thinking - but not expressing very well - is that the hypothesis appears to suggest that nothing i can do can change the proportion of worlds in which I do the right thing.
Consider Meursault, the protagonist of Camus's l'Etranger, standing on the beach, pointing a gun at a man. As Robert Smith so chillingly puts it:
I could turn and walk away or I could fire the gun
Staring at the sky, staring at the sun
Whatever I choose it amounts to the same
Absolutely nothing
Maybe there are only 1% of worlds in which Meursault shoots. But if he chooses not to shoot he hasn't changed those proportions. He has just selected which of the worlds he experiences. And by doing so he has implicitly made another version of him in another world kill the man and experience the consequences of doing so. In a sense, his choices are a zero sum game.
I don't follow this point. Can you expand on it? Are you referring to the conceptual problems surrounding the concept of free will?Another point - this moral issue, if it is one, is still there if MWI is not true