The Hedonistic Imperative - David Pearce
Bruce Klein
19 Feb 2004
THE HEDONISTIC IMPERATIVE
A B S T R A C T
This manifesto outlines a strategy to eradicate suffering in all sentient life. The abolitionist project is ambitious, implausible, but technically feasible. It is defended here on ethical utilitarian grounds. Genetic engineering and nanotechnology allow Homo sapiens to discard the legacy-wetware of our evolutionary past. Our post-human successors will rewrite the vertebrate genome, redesign the global ecosystem, and abolish suffering throughout the living world.
The metabolic pathways of pain and malaise evolved only because they served the inclusive fitness of our genes in the ancestral environment. They can be replaced by a radically different sort of neural architecture. Life-long happiness of an intensity now physiologically unimaginable can become the genetically-preprogrammed norm of mental health. A sketch is offered of when, and why, this major evolutionary transition in the history of life is likely to occur. Possible objections, both practical and moral, are raised and then rebutted.
Today's images of opiate-addled junkies, and the lever-pressing frenzies of intra-cranially self-stimulating rats, are deceptive. Such stereotypes stigmatise, and falsely discredit, the only remedy for the world's horrors and everyday discontents that is biologically realistic. For it is misleading to contrast social and intellectual development with perpetual happiness. There need be no such trade-off. States of "dopamine-overdrive" can actually enhance exploratory and goal-directed activity. Hyper-dopaminergic states can also increase the range and diversity of actions an organism finds rewarding. So our descendants may live in a civilisation of well-motivated "high-achievers", animated by gradients of bliss. Their productivity may far eclipse our own.
Two hundred years ago, before the development of potent synthetic pain-killers or surgical anaesthetics, the notion that "physical" pain could be banished from most people's lives would have seemed no less bizarre. Most of us in the developed world now take its daily absence for granted. The prospect that what we describe as "mental" pain, too, could one day be superseded is equally counter-intuitive. The technical option of its abolition turns its deliberate retention into an issue of political policy and ethical choice.
more:
http://hedweb.com/hedab.htm
A B S T R A C T
This manifesto outlines a strategy to eradicate suffering in all sentient life. The abolitionist project is ambitious, implausible, but technically feasible. It is defended here on ethical utilitarian grounds. Genetic engineering and nanotechnology allow Homo sapiens to discard the legacy-wetware of our evolutionary past. Our post-human successors will rewrite the vertebrate genome, redesign the global ecosystem, and abolish suffering throughout the living world.
The metabolic pathways of pain and malaise evolved only because they served the inclusive fitness of our genes in the ancestral environment. They can be replaced by a radically different sort of neural architecture. Life-long happiness of an intensity now physiologically unimaginable can become the genetically-preprogrammed norm of mental health. A sketch is offered of when, and why, this major evolutionary transition in the history of life is likely to occur. Possible objections, both practical and moral, are raised and then rebutted.
Today's images of opiate-addled junkies, and the lever-pressing frenzies of intra-cranially self-stimulating rats, are deceptive. Such stereotypes stigmatise, and falsely discredit, the only remedy for the world's horrors and everyday discontents that is biologically realistic. For it is misleading to contrast social and intellectual development with perpetual happiness. There need be no such trade-off. States of "dopamine-overdrive" can actually enhance exploratory and goal-directed activity. Hyper-dopaminergic states can also increase the range and diversity of actions an organism finds rewarding. So our descendants may live in a civilisation of well-motivated "high-achievers", animated by gradients of bliss. Their productivity may far eclipse our own.
Two hundred years ago, before the development of potent synthetic pain-killers or surgical anaesthetics, the notion that "physical" pain could be banished from most people's lives would have seemed no less bizarre. Most of us in the developed world now take its daily absence for granted. The prospect that what we describe as "mental" pain, too, could one day be superseded is equally counter-intuitive. The technical option of its abolition turns its deliberate retention into an issue of political policy and ethical choice.
more:
http://hedweb.com/hedab.htm
PaulH
19 Feb 2004
Thanks for posting this Bruce! I think The Hedonistic Imperative is one of the most important, seminal and overlooked transhuman pieces ever written. David Pearce is simply brilliant. It has formed the corner stone of all my transhumanist thinking over the last 7 years.
Bruce Klein
19 Feb 2004
I agree.. I wonder if you know why David is no longer working closely with WTA as he helped to found it with Nick Bostrom.
PaulH
19 Feb 2004
I'm not sure. Dave and I become close friends many years back, and I always intended to meet him next time I came to the UK, but I ended up loosing touch with him. I actually wanted him to come in as a co-author on my book, but we lost touch with each other, and I never heard back from him. In either case, his important work lives on as a legacy and has had a deep influence on many transhumanists.
Jace Tropic
19 Feb 2004
I had an email exchange with David Pearce a few months ago. From what I understand, he doesn't endorse the possibility of sentient AI. That could be a reason why he's not working closely with WTA. Although he did also mentioned that he's been very busy.
John Doe
19 Feb 2004
The HI is such a beautiful book.
I am referencing the HI in a paper that I am writing about transhumanism and ethics. I can post that paper at my website soon.
I am referencing the HI in a paper that I am writing about transhumanism and ethics. I can post that paper at my website soon.
jroseland
27 Jan 2021
In this TED Talk Dr. Daniel Kahneman, Inventor of Behavioral Economics, explains how our happiness is determined and sometimes distorted by what he describes as our two selves.
