CHAPTER 18: THE ABSURD CONCLUSION

Candidate theories may classified according to quantity or quality of value:

quantity = the sum total of happiness (or whatever makes life worth living)

quality = the happiness (or whatever makes life worth living) of individual lives

 Seven Candidates for Theory X (see p. 403)
 
View Quantity Quality Problems
1 Total Principle

(either impersonal or person-affecting forms)

 Is the only form of value Has no value Implies Repugnant Conclusion
2 Has value Has value, but a loss of quality can always be outweighed by gain in quantity More plausible than 1, but still implies Repugnant Conclusion
3 Appeal to the Valueless Level Has value, but only in lives whose quality is above a certain level (though some lives below that level are personally worth living) Has value; loss of quality cannot always be outweighed by gain in quantity Implies (A) and (R)—variants of the absurd conclusion and the repugnant conclusions and mere addition paradox 
4 Lexical View (cf. superman and herd) There is no limit to the positive value of quantity. But in lives whose quality is mediocre, no quantity could be as good one life whose quality is blissful  Has value; loss of quality cannot always be outweighed by gain in quantity Implies (A) and (R)—variants of the absurd conclusion and the repugnant conclusion and mere addition paradox
5 As quantity increases, the value of extra quantity asymptotically approaches zero; but the limit at which this occurs is higher the higher the quality Has value; loss of quality cannot always be outweighed by gain in quantity More plausible than 6 or 7; but refuted by the Absurd Conclusion
6 Limited Quantity View: it will be worse if there is a smaller total of happiness than there might have been, unless this smaller sum is above a certain limit  Value of quantity has an upper limit, which has already been reached Has value; loss of quality cannot always be outweighed by gain in quantity More plausible than 7; but refuted by the Absurd Conclusion
7 Only quality matters (e.g., Average Principles in either impersonal or person-affecting forms) Has no value Is the only form of value Refuted by the Two Hells (406) and by Hell Three (422)
 

The Repugnant Conclusion:

For any possible population of at least ten billion people, all with a very high quality of life, there must be some much larger imaginable population whose existence, if other things are equal, would be better, even though its members have lives that are barely worth living.

The Two Hells (406):

Hell 1: Last generation consists of 10 people who suffer terribly for 50 years

Hell 2: Last generation consists of 10,000,000 people who suffer just as much for 50 years minus a day.

 This refutes all forms of the AverageView.

 

The Absurd Conclusion: Consider

  1. a huge population in which one person in 10 billion has a life of unmitigated misery
  2. a succession of populations of 10 billion each in which one person in 10 billion has a life of unmitigated misery
On asymmetrical views (views which limit positive but not negative quantity—i.e., views 5-6) the first outcome is very bad, the second very good. Conclusion: since we cannot limit the badness of unmitigated suffering, there can be no limit to quantity's positive value.

Variants of Absurd and Repugnant Conclusions

Appeal to Valueless Level Implies variants of the absurd and repugnant conclusions:

(A) If there were an enormous population, in which one in 10 billion would have a life not worth living, and the others would have lives just below the valueless level, this would be worse than if there were nobody at all. (Positive value doesn't count below the valueless level.)

(R) If there were 10 billion people with a high quality of life, then there could be a much larger population whose existence would be better, even though its members all have lives barely above the valueless level.

 If we replace the word 'valueless' by 'mediocre', the same conclusions follow from the Lexical View.

Hence none of the seven views seems to work.
 
 

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