To try to better understand your value system, I’m going to take what I think you value, attempt to subdivide it in half, and then reconnect it together, and see if it is still valuable. Please feel free to critique any flaws in the following story.
The seller of the Venus tells you “This Venus is the original, carried from Earth on a shuttle, that went through many twists and turns, and near accidents to get here.” and there was recently a shuttle carrying “untransportium.” so that is extremely plausible and he is a trustworthy seller. You feel confident you have just bought the original Venus.
However, later you find out that someone else next door has one of those duplicates of the Venus. He got it for much much cheaper, but you still enjoy your original. You do have to admit you can’t tell them apart in the slightest.
Then later than that, you find out that a unrelated old man who just died had been having fun with you two by flipping a coin, and periodically switching the two Venuses from one house to the other when it came up tails. He cremated himself beyond recovery, so can’t be revived and interrogated, and you have confirmed video evidence he appears to have switched the Venuses multiple times in a pattern which resembles that of someone deciding on a fair coinflip, but there doesn’t appear to be a way of determining the specific number of switches with any substantial accuracy (video records only go back so far, and you did manage to find an eyewitness who confirms he had done it since before the beginning of the video records). A probabilistic best guess gives you a 50-50 shot of having the original at this point.
Your neighbor, who doesn’t really care about the causal history of his Venus, offers to sell you his Venus for part of the price you paid for the original, and then buy himself another replica. Then you will be as certain as you were before to have the original (and you will also have a replica), but you won’t know which of the two is which.
Is it worth buying the other Venus at all if you don’t particularly value replicas?
In relation to a percent of the original, how much would you feel comfortable paying?
I guess another way of expressing what I’m trying to figure out is “Do you value having the original itself, or being able to tell the original apart from replicas, and if so can you split those two apart (in the way I tried to in the story) and tell me how much you value each?”
“Do you value having the original itself, or being able to tell the original apart from replicas, and if so can you split those two apart (in the way I tried to in the story) and tell me how much you value each?”
The value of both, one of them being the original, would be a lot less than the original. I’d pay maybe 40% for both. The value of just one would reduce to a small fraction. I wouldn’t be interested to buy it at all. The reason is the loss of information.
To try to better understand your value system, I’m going to take what I think you value, attempt to subdivide it in half, and then reconnect it together, and see if it is still valuable. Please feel free to critique any flaws in the following story.
The seller of the Venus tells you “This Venus is the original, carried from Earth on a shuttle, that went through many twists and turns, and near accidents to get here.” and there was recently a shuttle carrying “untransportium.” so that is extremely plausible and he is a trustworthy seller. You feel confident you have just bought the original Venus.
However, later you find out that someone else next door has one of those duplicates of the Venus. He got it for much much cheaper, but you still enjoy your original. You do have to admit you can’t tell them apart in the slightest.
Then later than that, you find out that a unrelated old man who just died had been having fun with you two by flipping a coin, and periodically switching the two Venuses from one house to the other when it came up tails. He cremated himself beyond recovery, so can’t be revived and interrogated, and you have confirmed video evidence he appears to have switched the Venuses multiple times in a pattern which resembles that of someone deciding on a fair coinflip, but there doesn’t appear to be a way of determining the specific number of switches with any substantial accuracy (video records only go back so far, and you did manage to find an eyewitness who confirms he had done it since before the beginning of the video records). A probabilistic best guess gives you a 50-50 shot of having the original at this point.
Your neighbor, who doesn’t really care about the causal history of his Venus, offers to sell you his Venus for part of the price you paid for the original, and then buy himself another replica. Then you will be as certain as you were before to have the original (and you will also have a replica), but you won’t know which of the two is which.
Is it worth buying the other Venus at all if you don’t particularly value replicas? In relation to a percent of the original, how much would you feel comfortable paying?
I guess another way of expressing what I’m trying to figure out is “Do you value having the original itself, or being able to tell the original apart from replicas, and if so can you split those two apart (in the way I tried to in the story) and tell me how much you value each?”
The value of both, one of them being the original, would be a lot less than the original. I’d pay maybe 40% for both. The value of just one would reduce to a small fraction. I wouldn’t be interested to buy it at all. The reason is the loss of information.