What is the benefit of thinking in terms of sub-agents instead of cognitive processes?
In some of the relevant situations I’ve observed, I might describe the conflict more naturally as being between two mental processes. Here’s an example. I usually eat lunch around noon and thus often think of eating lunch around noon. The other day I woke up later than usual and ate breakfast later than I normally do. When noon rolled around I still felt an urge to eat lunch even though I wasn’t hungry. My goal-oriented reasoning process (focused on why I should be eating lunch) was butting heads with my eat-lunch-because-it’s-noon heuristic.
Thinking in terms of sub-agents may be a useful way to cluster mental processes and model them as a group, and perhaps leverage our capacity for social reasoning. Are there situations where we should think in terms of individual mental processes and their structure? What heuristics can we use to switch effectively between these perspectives?
What is the benefit of thinking in terms of sub-agents instead of cognitive processes?
In some of the relevant situations I’ve observed, I might describe the conflict more naturally as being between two mental processes. Here’s an example. I usually eat lunch around noon and thus often think of eating lunch around noon. The other day I woke up later than usual and ate breakfast later than I normally do. When noon rolled around I still felt an urge to eat lunch even though I wasn’t hungry. My goal-oriented reasoning process (focused on why I should be eating lunch) was butting heads with my eat-lunch-because-it’s-noon heuristic.
Thinking in terms of sub-agents may be a useful way to cluster mental processes and model them as a group, and perhaps leverage our capacity for social reasoning. Are there situations where we should think in terms of individual mental processes and their structure? What heuristics can we use to switch effectively between these perspectives?