- 7 weeks ago
Philosopher Stefan Molyneux follows up on Freedomain Podcasts 6141, "Evaluating President TRUMP!", exploring the relationship between ethics and emergencies through the lens of the Universally Preferable Behavior (UPB) framework. It distinguishes between universally preferable actions and aesthetic preferences, illustrated by examples like timeliness and swearing. The discussion highlights ethical dilemmas in medical decision-making, particularly the choice of allocating a ventilator, framing these choices as voluntary and based on relative preferences rather than moral absolutes.
Stefan contemplates the quality versus quantity of life and suggests simplifying terminology to enhance clarity. Audience engagement prompts reflection on personal preferences in ethical dilemmas, such as the balance between fitness and charitable actions. Ultimately, he emphasizes the complexity of ethical decision-making and the impact of individual choices on societal welfare.
Listen to "Evaluating President TRUMP!" at https://fdrpodcasts.com/6141/evaluating-president-trump
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Stefan contemplates the quality versus quantity of life and suggests simplifying terminology to enhance clarity. Audience engagement prompts reflection on personal preferences in ethical dilemmas, such as the balance between fitness and charitable actions. Ultimately, he emphasizes the complexity of ethical decision-making and the impact of individual choices on societal welfare.
Listen to "Evaluating President TRUMP!" at https://fdrpodcasts.com/6141/evaluating-president-trump
SUBSCRIBE TO ME ON X! https://x.com/StefanMolyneux
Follow me on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@freedomain1
GET MY NEW BOOK 'PEACEFUL PARENTING', THE INTERACTIVE PEACEFUL PARENTING AI, AND THE FULL AUDIOBOOK!
https://peacefulparenting.com/
Join the PREMIUM philosophy community on the web for free!
Subscribers get 12 HOURS on the "Truth About the French Revolution," multiple interactive multi-lingual philosophy AIs trained on thousands of hours of my material - as well as AIs for Real-Time Relationships, Bitcoin, Peaceful Parenting, and Call-In Shows!
You also receive private livestreams, HUNDREDS of exclusive premium shows, early release podcasts, the 22 Part History of Philosophers series and much more!
See you soon!
https://freedomain.locals.com/support/promo/UPB2025
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LearningTranscript
00:00Just a little follow-up to the call earlier today, which is a very, very good call.
00:05And I'm always amazed and impressed at how much there is, after 44 years in philosophy,
00:15there's this endless cavalcade of obvious and hindsight and basic questions that need
00:20to be answered and deserve to be answered.
00:23And the one that the fellow today came with, which was about the ethics of emergencies,
00:32was very interesting.
00:35So, I think that the UPB framework handles this.
00:38I try not to sort of wedge things in too much, but I think that the UPB framework handles this.
00:44So, in UPB, you have universally preferable behavior, that which is preferable and enforceable.
00:54And we have aesthetically preferable actions, that which are specific and universal and
01:04not enforceable.
01:05So, for instance, being on time.
01:08It's a specific action.
01:10It's good for everyone to be on time.
01:13It's better for everyone to be on time.
01:14As a good and evil, better or worse.
01:17It's better to be on time, but it's not enforceable through violence.
01:23Another example, of course, would be, let's say, not swearing in front of children.
01:29To swear in front of children would be an aesthetically negative action.
01:32It's a specific action.
01:34Swearing, like being on time.
01:36It is universal.
01:37It is always better to not swear in front of children, but it's not enforceable violently.
01:42It would be enforceable through ostracism or detachment.
01:46If somebody keeps swearing in front of your kids, then you just don't hang with them.
01:51You don't spend time.
01:53Being polite or swearing at people or something like that, being polite, being reasonably diplomatic
02:00and so on, is better than being, you know, rude or horrible.
02:05It's universal in that it's better as a whole.
02:09And again, this is the initiation of action, not necessarily response to action.
02:12If somebody swears at you, you can swear back.
02:14That's sort of the equivalent of self-defense, but it's not enforceable.
02:18So not swearing at someone or not being, being polite rather than rude, it's not enforceable
02:23because it's better, not good and evil.
02:26It's better, worse, not good and evil.
02:27And the reason why is that if somebody uses violence against you, you don't have an option.
02:34If somebody is late every time you get together, you have the option to avoid that peacefully.
02:39If somebody pulls a knife on you and says, give me your wallet, right, you don't have
02:44the option to avoid that peacefully.
02:46You have no responsibility in the matter.
02:50But if you have a friend who's always late or swears around your kids, you have a responsibility
02:55in the matter because you're voluntarily bringing that person into your life.
03:00So aesthetically preferable actions, being nice, not swearing around kids, not swearing
03:06at people, being reasonably polite and not really rude, making a joke about someone's
03:13kid that's really harsh and cruel, you can't put people in jail for that.
03:17You can't shoot people for that because you're voluntarily bringing that person into your life
03:22and therefore it is not coercively inflicted upon you.
03:25You can't have something inflicted upon you that is also your choice.
03:30You can't say, I choose to have sex with this man and he's raping me.
03:36Again, assuming that he's not got a knife to your throat, in which case you're not choosing
03:39to have sex with him, you're choosing to not be stabbed.
03:42So in UPB, under aesthetically preferable actions, APA, you cannot use violence against
03:49a person you have invited into your life repeatedly.
03:52You can choose to leave the situation.
03:54It's the same thing that if you're in a bar and somebody starts saying mean things to
03:58you, you can leave the situation.
04:01You can move, you can go to another bar, you can go home.
04:04But once somebody is using violence against you, then you are no longer in the situation
04:10where you are choosing to have this in your life.
04:14Now it's being inflicted upon you violently and there's no escape.
04:17There's a sort of tried and true way to get someone in trouble, which is to verbally provoke
04:25them until they put hands on you in anger.
04:29And then in many places, this is not legal advice, this is just my amateur understanding.
04:33But what you do is you provoke someone verbally until they lay hands on you in anger and then
04:41you can hit them, right?
04:44This is a friend of mine who was a bouncer many years ago and was sort of telling me about
04:47this.
04:48So the question of who you save in a medical emergency, does that fall under aesthetically
04:59preferable actions?
05:02So if you're a doctor, as the fellow said today, you're a doctor, you have one ventilator
05:09and two patients who are dying and they both need the ventilator.
05:13And let's just say, you know, they're equal in terms of danger and so on.
05:19Well, that situation is not being inflicted on you in the same way that, you know, Sophie's
05:27choice or, you know, some guy says, I'm going to shoot Bob or Doug, you tell me which, right?
05:33Then the person who's going to shoot someone is, he's inflicting that on you, that choice
05:39on you through violence, assuming that if you don't choose, he'll shoot you.
05:42But if you are a doctor, then the choice of who to give the ventilator to is not something
05:51that is coercively inflicted upon you because you chose to be a doctor and you are being
05:57paid for these decisions.
05:59So it's not being the recipient of violence.
06:03So because it is not being the recipient of violence to be a doctor who has to choose
06:07who gets the ventilator, then it falls under aesthetically preferred behavior.
06:14Now, I understand saying it's like being polite or swearing in front of kids and so on, in a
06:20sense, choosing who lives or who dies.
06:22But that is your job and you're being paid to do it and you studied for it and you trained
06:29for it and you got mentored for it.
06:33So this choice is not being inflicted upon you.
06:35In fact, you pursued it for many years and you're being well paid to make those kinds of
06:39choices.
06:39So it is not being inflicted upon you.
06:44It is a difficult choice, but it is a difficult choice that you have pursued the making of that
06:52difficult choice for many years and you're getting paid hundreds of thousands of dollars
06:56a year to make these choices.
06:59So we are talking about better and worse, not good and evil.
07:08So if we have the 90-year-old chain smoker and we have the six-year-old boy, they both
07:13need the ventilator.
07:14Who is the better choice for the ventilator?
07:18Well, obviously, it's the six-year-old boy.
07:22He's a better choice.
07:23So these are better and worse choices.
07:26And the fact that there are lives attached to them does not budge them out of the category
07:32of APA.
07:34And listen, I designed UPB and aesthetically preferable actions without this level of intensity
07:41in mind.
07:42So, you know, maybe APA is not, you know, quite the right word or aesthetically it's not the
07:47right phrase, whatever.
07:48I mean, that's...
07:49But good and evil is UPB.
07:53The better and worse is APA.
07:59And let's see, can we get the 90-year-old smoker versus the six-year-old boy?
08:06It is...
08:07Can we say that that is an aesthetic choice?
08:09Now, aesthetic generally means artistic or standard of beauty or politeness or niceness
08:15or something like that.
08:16But it seems tough.
08:19And I don't want to obviously wedge something in unjustly.
08:21It seems tough to say that's an aesthetic choice.
08:24Because that would be like saying, who's prettier?
08:27Who's got the most sculpted abs or whatever, right?
08:30So the basis of the choice would be the standard pragmatic or utilitarian argument for the
08:39maximization of human happiness.
08:41If you save the six-year-old boy, he's going to have 80 years ahead of him in, you know, most of it in good health.
08:49But if you save the 90-year-old chain smoker with lung cancer, he's only going to have another six months of pain.
08:58So in this sense, you would be maximizing human well-being, human health, and human longevity, if that makes sense.
09:07Now, is that an aesthetic choice to say, more and healthier life is better?
09:16That's interesting.
09:17I mean, I'm open to the possibility.
09:18I'm not sure yet because, again, the word aesthetic has kind of been grounded in my brain to be, you know, this is a nicer painting.
09:25This is a better painting.
09:26This is a more attractive person.
09:28Or, you know, this car has a great aesthetic.
09:31You know, whatever.
09:32It's got nice fins or whatever you like.
09:33So a doctor is focusing on quality of life and quantity of life.
09:41I mean, a doctor could eliminate every disease by cutting your head off or shooting you in the head or something, right?
09:47I mean, then the disease is gone, but so is your life.
09:49So the doctor is trying to make a balanced choice between longevity and health.
09:58And there are doctors who would say, oncologists and so on, who would say things like, you know, eventually you get this sort of dreaded language, usually.
10:07So there are doctors who would say, we could try another round of chemo radiation, but it's unlikely to do any good.
10:16And it's going to make your last couple of months horrible.
10:19Or we can put you on painkillers and you can have a clear head and not be throwing up all the time and not be physically weak.
10:26Right.
10:27So that is a matter of more time is better unless it's not much more time and the cure is worse than the illness, so to speak.
10:37Again, I don't know how doctors make these decisions.
10:40I'm just going off.
10:40Stuff I've seen is sort of a rule.
10:42I think a common sense rule of thumb.
10:44So it is, is it an aesthetic choice, aesthetics being better than, rather than good and evil?
10:51It certainly is better to not swear around children.
10:55It certainly is better to be on time.
10:58It certainly is better to be reasonably diplomatic rather than brutally rude.
11:03And is it fair to say that in the same category, it's better to work for or to work on the paradigm or the principle that more and better life is, sorry, more and healthier life is better than less and unhealthier life?
11:24Yes.
11:25Yes, because somebody who violates UPB is evil.
11:32But somebody who says, let's say that they get cancer and they say, I don't want treatment, even if the treatment is, you know, reasonably likely to make them better.
11:41They say, I don't want treatment.
11:43I want to have a quality of life rather than length of life.
11:49And the treatment is going to interfere with my quality of life.
11:51So I just want length of life.
11:53Right.
11:54Is that evil?
11:56I don't think it is.
11:58I don't think it is evil.
12:00It may be very upsetting.
12:02It may be a decision that other people wouldn't appreciate or like or value, but it wouldn't be evil to refuse treatment.
12:12The doctor will sign, but you don't go to jail for refusing treatment, which means that treatment is not a moral choice.
12:22Treatment treatment is, to some degree, an aesthetic choice.
12:26I prefer a longer life, even at the expense of short-term comfort, which is some horrible medicine.
12:34But it is not evil to refuse treatment.
12:37It may be a little incomprehensible.
12:39It may be unwise, but it's not evil.
12:41You wouldn't throw someone in jail and force them to be treated.
12:46Hashtag forget about COVID for the moment.
12:47So our treatment options, and this is tentative, like just understand, I'm just working through things here.
12:55I'm just sort of giving you the making of thoughts.
12:57So to say, I would rather have six months of good health and then die, as opposed to six months of bad health and then have a 10% chance of living, or like whatever it is, especially if you're old, right?
13:17You would make choices.
13:19And those choices are better and worse, not good and evil.
13:24Well, I mean, I knew a guy once who had a hernia, and he went to get the hernia repaired, and the doctor said, you know, you could just live with it.
13:32And I guess that's a choice, right?
13:35It's, is it better to get the hernia operation, to get the mesh or the shoulders treatment?
13:42Is it better to get your hernia repaired, or is it better to live with it?
13:48That was an option.
13:49Is it better to be muddle-headed and take painkillers, or to be in pain and be clear-headed?
13:57These are aesthetic choices.
14:01Again, I'm not super comfortable with the word aesthetic, because it sounds kind of Oscar Wilde, you know.
14:09But better or worse, that's not morally good or evil, or maybe, it's hard to say, because I'm just thinking, like, we could have, instead of UPB and APA, instead of universally preferable behavior and aesthetically preferable actions, perhaps we could say universally preferable behavior and then just preferable behavior.
14:33So there's the UPB, and then the PB, which would be a little simpler, universally preferable behavior versus preferable behavior.
14:42I gotta tell you, I think that, like, almost 20 years ago, I think I ran through this in my head, but I thought it was going to be too confusing to have UPB and then just PB.
14:51I thought it was going to be too confusing to explain the difference, which is why I did UPB and APA, I think.
14:58I think that that's my memory of it.
15:00So, that's interesting.
15:02So, if you are saying, I prefer, like as I was saying in the show with the fellow, I was saying that I prefer to work out, which means I need an extra 600 to 800 calories a day.
15:20I prefer to work out rather than donate the money that I use for my food to somebody who is really hungry.
15:29That is aesthetically preferable action because it's not evil for me to work out and for other people, perhaps, to go hungry.
15:41Well, I mean, who knows?
15:43Other people might step up, but let's just say other people go hungry because I work out.
15:47Because I could take the money that I spend on the food that is needed because I work out and instead use it to feed others.
15:56So, that's aesthetically preferable actions.
15:58But, see, in that case, it's hard to say.
16:01For me, honestly, I'll be honest, it's hard to say.
16:03If I don't work out, my quality of life diminishes.
16:06But, of course, if I don't work out, my quality of life diminishes, but other people's quality of life improves.
16:16And it improves, of course, because they have food in their belly, right?
16:23Having food in your belly when you're hungry is more important to your quality of life than for me to have my little muscles on my body.
16:33So, human happiness would be served, a plus of human happiness would be served if I did not exercise.
16:43But, instead, I donated the food that I need because I exercise to others.
16:49In the same way, everybody could conceivably live in a tent.
16:54And, therefore, if you have any housing over and above a tent, then you are taking away from other people because you could, you know, as Jesus says, right?
17:04Take all of your belongings, sell them all, and then give your money to the poor.
17:12So, for me, I would not force someone to give to the poor.
17:17Or, you could say it's aesthetically preferable action to give to the poor.
17:22However, giving to the poor is complicated.
17:26And it's not just about giving resources.
17:28You know, the argument that I sort of have with myself is the more philosophy I'm able to do, the better the world will be.
17:39That's the sort of basic equation that I work with.
17:41The more philosophy I'm able to do, the better the world will be.
17:43Now, what that means is that if I exercise and eat well and get good sleep and so on, then I'm able to do good philosophy for longer.
17:53I'm able to do for philosophy.
17:54Let's say that working out gives me another three years on my lifespan.
17:59I'm just making that up, right?
18:00But let's say, so that's, you know, that's a lot of shows.
18:03There's a lot of this, you know, hundreds and hundreds of hours of quality philosophy that the world gets because I work out.
18:07Now, of course, you can say, ah, but what about the time that you lose from working out?
18:12So, I get all of that for sure.
18:14But let's say there's a net, there's a net of plus to it.
18:18Or let's say it's not necessarily three years extra of life, but it is three years extra of robust health, right?
18:27And I can't do philosophy 24 hours a day, so I might as well work out when I can't be doing philosophy in perpetuity.
18:34So, and giving philosophy away for free really helps the poor.
18:40So, it's not just about giving them their daily bread.
18:42It's also about being able to do philosophy, which really helps the poor, and so on, right?
18:49So, that's, I think I am working to maximize helping the poor, insofar as I'm giving good philosophy away for no fee, no charge, right?
19:02So, yeah, I think we could put this into aesthetically preferable actions, in that it's not good and evil.
19:09Well, it's better and worse.
19:12That might actually fit and work.
19:14And, of course, I'd love to know your thoughts.
19:15Let me know what you think.
19:16Freedomain.com slash donate.
19:18Hope you guys are doing well.
19:19Talk to you soon.
19:20Bye!
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