I wasn’t expecting to based on the title, but I like this. I think it’s important to be able to hold commitments in mind for your future self. But it’s also important, when trying to hold your future self to something, to be conservative about what you commit to so you don’t screw up your ability to make these commitments in the future.
I can think of several times when I explicitly tried to … do something like acausal trade … with my future self.
When I was about 9 years old, I had a very complex set of relationships with other kids, including some kind of “war” and an on/off relationship with a specific boy. I remember thinking to myself, “Usually, when people are adults, they think this kind of thing that kids do is stupid. But future me, you’d better not do that. Think of this as important. This is really important to me.”
When I was deciding which college to go to, I attended a weekend at one of the places I was accepted that they held to attract students. I really enjoyed it, but the college was extremely expensive. I thought, “Hey, future self… I don’t want to hold you to this, but listen, this is REALLY nice. I know it’s expensive, but seriously try to work out if there is any way you can go here, for real.”
When I was giving birth (recently), I thought, “You know, I’ve been planning to do this again, but holy shit, it sucks. Future self, seriously consider whether this is actually worth it.”
I’m shaping up to ~violate the commitment in all 3 cases, but I think there are good reasons that past-me would accept if they knew.
1: I don’t find it that important in retrospect, but it’s not because I was “only a child” at the time; it’s because basically all things in life recede in importance when they happened to you a long time ago and you don’t interact with the relevant people anymore. I plan to try to honor this commitment by having more respect for the experiences of children in general.
2: I didn’t attend the expensive college. I did try quite hard to figure out if it was feasible, but unfortunately I was lacking in good information about money at that time in my life. My best guess was that it would have been pretty crappy graduating with that much debt, and I now think that was basically true. Ultimately, though, my life would have been so different that it’s hard to say what the right decision was.
3: Haven’t had the opportunity yet, but I do plan to have another child, even keeping in mind the agony of childbirth (note that I did have medical pain relief, but they don’t tell you how bad it can be even with that). My past self wasn’t aware of how great having a newborn child was, and I like to think would agree that this is the right choice all told. (Also, later births are on average easier, so that helps too.)
I wasn’t expecting to based on the title, but I like this. I think it’s important to be able to hold commitments in mind for your future self. But it’s also important, when trying to hold your future self to something, to be conservative about what you commit to so you don’t screw up your ability to make these commitments in the future.
I can think of several times when I explicitly tried to … do something like acausal trade … with my future self.
When I was about 9 years old, I had a very complex set of relationships with other kids, including some kind of “war” and an on/off relationship with a specific boy. I remember thinking to myself, “Usually, when people are adults, they think this kind of thing that kids do is stupid. But future me, you’d better not do that. Think of this as important. This is really important to me.”
When I was deciding which college to go to, I attended a weekend at one of the places I was accepted that they held to attract students. I really enjoyed it, but the college was extremely expensive. I thought, “Hey, future self… I don’t want to hold you to this, but listen, this is REALLY nice. I know it’s expensive, but seriously try to work out if there is any way you can go here, for real.”
When I was giving birth (recently), I thought, “You know, I’ve been planning to do this again, but holy shit, it sucks. Future self, seriously consider whether this is actually worth it.”
I’m shaping up to ~violate the commitment in all 3 cases, but I think there are good reasons that past-me would accept if they knew.
1: I don’t find it that important in retrospect, but it’s not because I was “only a child” at the time; it’s because basically all things in life recede in importance when they happened to you a long time ago and you don’t interact with the relevant people anymore. I plan to try to honor this commitment by having more respect for the experiences of children in general.
2: I didn’t attend the expensive college. I did try quite hard to figure out if it was feasible, but unfortunately I was lacking in good information about money at that time in my life. My best guess was that it would have been pretty crappy graduating with that much debt, and I now think that was basically true. Ultimately, though, my life would have been so different that it’s hard to say what the right decision was.
3: Haven’t had the opportunity yet, but I do plan to have another child, even keeping in mind the agony of childbirth (note that I did have medical pain relief, but they don’t tell you how bad it can be even with that). My past self wasn’t aware of how great having a newborn child was, and I like to think would agree that this is the right choice all told. (Also, later births are on average easier, so that helps too.)