the connection to the prisoners’ dilemma? (which is there from the very beginning, right?)
I think David Lewis was the first to observe this connection, in 1979, 10 years after Nozick’s publication of the problem. But the prisioner’s dilemma is only Newcomb-like if the two prisoners are psychological twins, i.e. if they use the same decision proceedure and know this about each other. One might object that this is just as unfair as Newcomb’s problem.
But the objection that Newcomb’s is unfair isn’t to be confused with the objection that it’s unrealistic. I think everybody working on the problem accepts that Newcomb-like situations are practically possible. Unfairness is a different issue.
Nozick mentioned PD. I’ve always heard it asserted that Newcomb started with PD (eg, here).
Oddly, Nozick does not give Newcomb’s first name. He talks about the problem on page 1, but waits to page 10 to say that it is the problem in the title of the paper.
Someone building a decision theory can equally well say that Newcomb’s problem and someone who threatens to duplicate them and make them play PD against their duplicate are equally unfair, but that’s not the connection.
I think David Lewis was the first to observe this connection, in 1979, 10 years after Nozick’s publication of the problem. But the prisioner’s dilemma is only Newcomb-like if the two prisoners are psychological twins, i.e. if they use the same decision proceedure and know this about each other. One might object that this is just as unfair as Newcomb’s problem.
But the objection that Newcomb’s is unfair isn’t to be confused with the objection that it’s unrealistic. I think everybody working on the problem accepts that Newcomb-like situations are practically possible. Unfairness is a different issue.
Nozick mentioned PD. I’ve always heard it asserted that Newcomb started with PD (eg, here).
Oddly, Nozick does not give Newcomb’s first name. He talks about the problem on page 1, but waits to page 10 to say that it is the problem in the title of the paper.
Someone building a decision theory can equally well say that Newcomb’s problem and someone who threatens to duplicate them and make them play PD against their duplicate are equally unfair, but that’s not the connection.
Ah, good to know, thanks.