The Hedonistic Imperative by David Pearce

Author:David Pearce
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3
Tags: jainism, negative utilitarianism, transhumanism, utilitarianism, superhappiness, singularity

Here's a contemporary parallel. It's possible to undergo, from a variety of causes, a complete bilateral loss of primary, secondary and "associative" visual cortex. People with Anton's Syndrome not only become blind; they are unaware of their sensory deficit. Furthermore, they lose all notion of the meaning of sight. They no longer possess the neurological substrates of the visual concepts by which their past and present condition could be compared and contrasted. Our genetically joyful descendants may, or may not, undergo an analogous loss of cognitive access to the nature and variant textures of suffering. Quite plausibly, they will have gradients of sublimity to animate their lives and infuse their thoughts. So at least they'll be able to make analogies and draw parallels. But fortunately for their sanity and well-being, they won't be able to grasp the true frightfulness lying behind any linguistic remnants of the past that survive into the post-Darwinian era. Such lack of contrast, or even the inconceivability of unpleasant experiences, won't leave tomorrow's native-born ecstatics any less happy; if anything, quite the reverse.

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