Last year, writer Aaron Powell reviewed Sam Harris' talk at TED and his book The Moral Landscape and had some interesting criticisms. I don't agree with all of them (I'm actually more confident in science's capacity to discover human values than Powell appears to be; I just think Harris has an extremely superficial view of what that means) but I do agree with many, and particularly this:
Far more troubling is the world Harris would have us embrace if we overlook the flaws and embrace his conclusions. Harris would have us turn over the definition of “well-being” to scientists with moral expertise. It is thus impossible not to be overcome with dread when reading lines like this: “The person who claims that he does not want to be better off,” Harris writes, “is either wrong about what he does, in fact, want (i.e, he doesn’t know what he’s missing), or he is lying, or he is not making sense.” This way lies totalitarianism [and] technocracy, a future Harris seems all too willing to embrace.
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