> If it's just an arbitrary personal preference on your part to have Adam go on to have a happy life, then you'd seem committed to not judging anyone who happens to have a different preference about the case. But it doesn't seem (to me at least) *optional* to regard Adam's death here as a bad thing.
> If it's just an arbitrary personal preference on your part to have Adam go on to have a happy life, then you'd seem committed to not judging anyone who happens to have a different preference about the case. But it doesn't seem (to me at least) *optional* to regard Adam's death here as a bad thing.
I don't think it's *arbitrary*; it's formed from the observation that in the vast majority of cases it will in fact be wrong for people to die suddenly, and blah blah blah. And I don't feel committed to judging those who feel differently; in particular, if *Adam himself* feels differently, then I don't see what grounds I have to disagree with him.
>> They aren't valuing Adam in the right kind of way -- and neither does anyone else who accepts C.
I'm not sure why they aren't: it seems to me that part of valuing other people is deferring to their judgement on what it is that would count as a valuable life for them; if their judgement is that no such life would count, then we should take them at their word.
I think part of the issue is that it's very hard to imagine that Adam's judgement is sound; maybe his depression is clouding him from imagining what a happy life might look like--and I think that's a very reasonable concern!
What's more, I think it's very difficult to conceive of how Adam could be instantaneously 100% cured of his depression and go on to live a life of joy if the capacity for that joy weren't somehow latent in him already; the very formulation of the scenario seems to be pushing on us the implicit meta-preference I mentioned before: if, within an instant, he is capable of being completely turned around, there must already be some part of him that *wants* to be turned around, and so we can't take at face value the idea that the depressive part of him is speaking on behalf of "all of him".
I even think it's very plausible that it is just a fact of human psychology, evolutionarily driven into us, that *all* human beings will always have *some* part of us that wants to keep living, and so on...in which case, no actual human being could ever be in an Adam-like position without triggering C.
> If it's just an arbitrary personal preference on your part to have Adam go on to have a happy life, then you'd seem committed to not judging anyone who happens to have a different preference about the case. But it doesn't seem (to me at least) *optional* to regard Adam's death here as a bad thing.
I don't think it's *arbitrary*; it's formed from the observation that in the vast majority of cases it will in fact be wrong for people to die suddenly, and blah blah blah. And I don't feel committed to judging those who feel differently; in particular, if *Adam himself* feels differently, then I don't see what grounds I have to disagree with him.
>> They aren't valuing Adam in the right kind of way -- and neither does anyone else who accepts C.
I'm not sure why they aren't: it seems to me that part of valuing other people is deferring to their judgement on what it is that would count as a valuable life for them; if their judgement is that no such life would count, then we should take them at their word.
I think part of the issue is that it's very hard to imagine that Adam's judgement is sound; maybe his depression is clouding him from imagining what a happy life might look like--and I think that's a very reasonable concern!
What's more, I think it's very difficult to conceive of how Adam could be instantaneously 100% cured of his depression and go on to live a life of joy if the capacity for that joy weren't somehow latent in him already; the very formulation of the scenario seems to be pushing on us the implicit meta-preference I mentioned before: if, within an instant, he is capable of being completely turned around, there must already be some part of him that *wants* to be turned around, and so we can't take at face value the idea that the depressive part of him is speaking on behalf of "all of him".
I even think it's very plausible that it is just a fact of human psychology, evolutionarily driven into us, that *all* human beings will always have *some* part of us that wants to keep living, and so on...in which case, no actual human being could ever be in an Adam-like position without triggering C.