Dr. Jonathan Ratner’s discussion is amazing and a valuable commentary (and sometimes a corrective) upon the work in our article. We are grateful for his thoughtful examination and testing of the assumptions and methodology we have used. His contribution goes far beyond a typical discussion and is an article in its own right, or at the very least a provocative essay. He makes many important points and builds out our reasoning and expands its scope in numerous ways. This response attempts to briefly address some of the key points and suggestions that he makes. Dr. Ratner is quite correct that we made the enormously simplifying assumption of a unitary decision-maker, the “president,” who need only consult his or her utility function, and whose analysis is rational and unselfish but completely proAmerican. Like everyone, we appreciate that the political realities are far more complex than that, but we believe that our deliberate simplification has the advantage of focusing attention on the simple question of whether the five wars (or military actions) under consideration led to good or bad economic outcomes for the United States as a whole. Clearly, one could address a more realistic decision-theoretic framework in which multiple stakeholders (Congress, generals, intelligence analysts, Halliburton, and many others) negotiate or coalesce or diverge in reaching a military decision, and that would surely lead to fascinating work in sociology and political science. But such modeling was not our intent. And we appreciate Dr. Ratner’s recognition that our primary goal was the cost-benefit analysis. Our emphasis on “the U.S.-centric utility function” bothered Dr. Ratner, and we readily acknowledge that it makes us morally uncomfortable too. We would prefer to live in a world in which the United States is not indifferent to the suffering of others and where altruism is part of the calculus of leadership. And we also think that considerations of decency are usually given some weight in the corridors of power. However, we also believe that a callous calculation of the bottom line is a necessary component of military and other policy decisions. Absent that starting point, there seems to be no principled basis for prioritizing cases and causes. Dr. Ratner would prefer to see “a sensitivity analysis, with an alternative, semi-altruistic utility function.” We think that would be interesting and useful, and effective altruism is always important. But (as Dr. Ratner points out later), our article is already heavily freighted with assumptions that have varying degrees of plausibility. Trying to monetize the lives of non-American

中文翻译：

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对“自由选择战争，成本效益分析和罗生门效应”的回应

乔纳森·拉特纳（Jonathan Ratner）博士的讨论令人惊讶，并且对我们本文的工作进行了宝贵的评论（有时甚至是纠正）。我们感谢他对我们使用的假设和方法进行了认真的检查和检验。他的贡献远远超出了典型的讨论范围，而且本身就是一篇文章，或者至少是一篇具有挑衅性的文章。他提出了许多重要观点，并建立了我们的推理，并以多种方式扩展了其范围。这个回应试图简要地解决他提出的一些关键点和建议。拉特纳博士非常正确，因为我们做出了一个统一的决策者，即“总统”的极大简化的假设，该总统仅需咨询其效用函数，其分析是理性，无私的，但却完全是美国人。像每个人一样 我们赞赏政治现实远比这复杂，但我们认为，我们经过精心简化的优势在于将注意力集中在简单的问题上，即所考虑的五次战争（或军事行动）是否会导致经济好转或坏转。整个美国 显然，可以解决一个更现实的决策理论框架，在该框架中，多个利益相关者（国会，将军，情报分析师，哈里伯顿和许多其他利益相关者）在达成军事决定时进行谈判或合并或分歧，这肯定会导致令人着迷的社会学和政治学。但是这种建模不是我们的意图。我们感谢拉特纳博士的认可，即我们的主要目标是成本效益分析。我们对“以美国为中心的效用函数”的强调困扰着拉特纳博士，并且我们很容易地承认这也使我们在道德上感到不舒服。我们宁愿生活在一个世界上，在这个世界上美国对其他国家的痛苦毫不冷漠，而利他主义是领导力演算的一部分。而且我们还认为，在权力的走廊中，通常会给与正派考虑。但是，我们也认为，对底线进行无情的计算是军事和其他政策决定的必要组成部分。如果没有这个起点，似乎没有原则上的依据来确定案件和原因的优先次序。Ratner博士更希望看到“敏感性分析，以及另一种半利他效用函数。” 我们认为这将是有趣且有用的，有效的利他主义始终很重要。但是（正如拉特纳博士稍后指出的那样），我们的文章已经充满了合理程度各不相同的假设。试图通过非美国人的生活货币化