To be clear, by “indexical values” in that context I assume you mean indexing on whether a given world is “real” vs “counterfactual,” not just indexical in the sense of being egoistic? (Because I think there are compelling reasons to reject UDT without being egoistic.)
To be clear, by “indexical values” in that context I assume you mean indexing on whether a given world is “real” vs “counterfactual,” not just indexical in the sense of being egoistic? (Because I think there are compelling reasons to reject UDT without being egoistic.)
I think being indexical in this sense (while being altruistic) can also lead you to reject UDT, but it doesn’t seem “compelling” that one should be altruistic this way. Want to expand on that?
(I might not reply further because of how historically I’ve found people seem to simply have different bedrock intuitions about this, but who knows!)
I intrinsically only care about the real world (I find the Tegmark IV arguments against this pretty unconvincing). As far as I can tell, the standard justification for acting as if one cares about nonexistent worlds is diachronic norms of rationality. But I don’t see an independent motivation for diachronic norms, as I explain here. Given this, I think it would be a mistake to pretend my preferences are something other than what they actually are.
If you only care about the real world and you’re sure there’s only one real world, then the fact that you at time 0 would sometimes want to bind yourself at time 1 (e.g., physically commit to some action or self-modify to perform some action at time 1) seems very puzzling or indicates that something must be wrong, because at time 1 you’re in a strictly better epistemic position, having found out more information about which world is real, so what sense does it make that your decision theory makes you-at-time-0 decide to override you-at-time-1′s decision?
(If you believed in something like Tegmark IV but your values constantly change to only care about the subset of worlds that you’re in, then time inconsistency, and wanting to override your later selves, would make more sense, as your earlier self and later self would simply have different values. But it seems counterintuitive to be altruistic this way.)
at time 1 you’re in a strictly better epistemic position
Right, but 1-me has different incentives by virtue of this epistemic position. Conditional on being at the ATM, 1-me would be better off not paying the driver. (Yet 0-me is better off if the driver predicts that 1-me will pay, hence the incentive to commit.)
I’m not sure if this is an instance of what you call “having different values” — if so I’d call that a confusing use of the phrase, and it doesn’t seem counterintuitive to me at all.
Thanks for clarifying!
To be clear, by “indexical values” in that context I assume you mean indexing on whether a given world is “real” vs “counterfactual,” not just indexical in the sense of being egoistic? (Because I think there are compelling reasons to reject UDT without being egoistic.)
I think being indexical in this sense (while being altruistic) can also lead you to reject UDT, but it doesn’t seem “compelling” that one should be altruistic this way. Want to expand on that?
(I might not reply further because of how historically I’ve found people seem to simply have different bedrock intuitions about this, but who knows!)
I intrinsically only care about the real world (I find the Tegmark IV arguments against this pretty unconvincing). As far as I can tell, the standard justification for acting as if one cares about nonexistent worlds is diachronic norms of rationality. But I don’t see an independent motivation for diachronic norms, as I explain here. Given this, I think it would be a mistake to pretend my preferences are something other than what they actually are.
If you only care about the real world and you’re sure there’s only one real world, then the fact that you at time 0 would sometimes want to bind yourself at time 1 (e.g., physically commit to some action or self-modify to perform some action at time 1) seems very puzzling or indicates that something must be wrong, because at time 1 you’re in a strictly better epistemic position, having found out more information about which world is real, so what sense does it make that your decision theory makes you-at-time-0 decide to override you-at-time-1′s decision?
(If you believed in something like Tegmark IV but your values constantly change to only care about the subset of worlds that you’re in, then time inconsistency, and wanting to override your later selves, would make more sense, as your earlier self and later self would simply have different values. But it seems counterintuitive to be altruistic this way.)
Right, but 1-me has different incentives by virtue of this epistemic position. Conditional on being at the ATM, 1-me would be better off not paying the driver. (Yet 0-me is better off if the driver predicts that 1-me will pay, hence the incentive to commit.)
I’m not sure if this is an instance of what you call “having different values” — if so I’d call that a confusing use of the phrase, and it doesn’t seem counterintuitive to me at all.