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comment by muskox
muskox  ·  3164 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Dear hubski, why are you proud of yourself?

But surely there's not a 1:1 ratio of the good things that you feel and the bad things that other people feel, right? Put another way, there must be some actions which are both good for you and not bad for others, or even just more good for you than they are bad for others.

Programming and contributing to open-source projects is a hobby enjoyed by many people, but it only serves to help other people by providing them with code. You could argue that they consume electricity or consumer goods like computers in the process, but even those things don't have to cause human suffering (the computer could be made entirely by robots, and could be solar powered).

You only have to stay away from actions which cause a net bad in order to remain an ethical person. You can do that and also enjoy life.



empty  ·  3164 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Can you, though? How much slave labor went into producing the electronics you use? The clothes you wear? The food you eat? How much suffering is endured by the people in the lower economic classes who work 12 hours a day to cook and clean and drive for you? How many hopes and dreams are given up by those in the service industries who have to work so hard just to make ends meet that they can't pursue education or other forms of self-improvement?

We in tech are extremely privileged. The vast scale of humanity is hard to comprehend. But the reality is that for every techie like you or me who lives a comfortable (or even luxurious) lifestyle, there's literally at least a thousand other people who are barely staying alive, let alone prospering. They're the ones who need religion and family to stay happy, because they sure don't get fulfillment out of their work.

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muskox  ·  3163 days ago  ·  link  ·  

My point wasn't that I personally lived an ethical life - far from it, I think that I could do much more than I currently do to make the lives of others better. Rather, my point was that it's theoretically possible to live a life that doesn't depend on the suffering of others. There's nothing intrinsic about pleasure that necessitates suffering.

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