If you offer me a $1:$1 bet that a six-sided die doesn’t land on a six, I take it. But now you tell me that the die landed on a six, and want to make the same bet about its outcome. Of course I don’t give the same answer!
My life is worth more to me than other lives; I couldn’t say by how much exactly, so I’m not prepared to answer any of the dice-rolling questions. However, I am aware that to person C, person A and person B have equal-worth lives, unless one of them is C’s spouse or child, and this provides an opportunity to make deals that benefit both me and other people who value their own lives more than mine.
So, for example, I would endorse the policy that bridges be manned in pairs, each of the two people being ready to push the other off. This is, effectively, a commitment to following the unselfish strategy, but one that applies to everyone. TDT offers a solution that doesn’t require commitments; but there, we need the vague assumption that I’m implementing the same algorithm as everyone else in the problem, and I’m not too sure that this applies.
Oh and also I think I would jump for a hypothetical wife and daughter (or even a hypothetical son, imagine that), but at that point the question becomes less interesting.
If you offer me a $1:$1 bet that a six-sided die doesn’t land on a six, I take it. But now you tell me that the die landed on a six, and want to make the same bet about its outcome. Of course I don’t give the same answer!
My life is worth more to me than other lives; I couldn’t say by how much exactly, so I’m not prepared to answer any of the dice-rolling questions. However, I am aware that to person C, person A and person B have equal-worth lives, unless one of them is C’s spouse or child, and this provides an opportunity to make deals that benefit both me and other people who value their own lives more than mine.
So, for example, I would endorse the policy that bridges be manned in pairs, each of the two people being ready to push the other off. This is, effectively, a commitment to following the unselfish strategy, but one that applies to everyone. TDT offers a solution that doesn’t require commitments; but there, we need the vague assumption that I’m implementing the same algorithm as everyone else in the problem, and I’m not too sure that this applies.
Oh and also I think I would jump for a hypothetical wife and daughter (or even a hypothetical son, imagine that), but at that point the question becomes less interesting.