Re: Our brains (preferences and the such)
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Since you acknowlege that you can't know other's preferences (and hence, their relative utility rankings of different alternatives) worrying about utility maximization for other people is stupid
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I can't Know, but I can know. Since other people also have brains, I can safely assume a good deal of things about them. This is why the human activity of giving advice is still around.
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I suspect you're already formulating a "but I didn't say I want to maximize other people's utility" response.
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No, I'm actually quite interested in maximizing other people's utility. I don't see why anyone other than a complete misanthrope wouldn't be interested in this to some degree.
Does this mean I want to force people to control their lives to strict degrees? No, but one of the main reasons for this is that utility cannot be maximized (for many people) under conditions where their choices are not theirs to make.
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