Are you claiming that you have no akrasia and that getting rid of it isn’t valuable?
If you are poor you can just lower the amount of money that you put into the commitment contract to have the same psychological value has the same amount of money has to upper-middle class people.
Maybe a $10 contract that you take equal a $1000 contract that an upper-middle class person takes.
Are you claiming that you have no akrasia and that getting rid of it isn’t valuable?
Well. Am I claiming that I have no akrasia and that getting rid of it (of something I don’t presumably have) isn’t valuable? Did I say anything about the worthlessness of getting rid of akrasia? Not as far as I remember, in fact I think it’s a valuable pursuit. Did I confess to not having any problems at all with akrasia? Why, I think I actually mentioned the contrary somewhere in there. So no, I’m not claiming that! (Not many people are likely to hold that position, so don’t ask that question.)
Now for your actual concern—well, yes, getting rid of akrasia is valuable, but it’s not necessarily economically valuable, in that not all related self-modifications increase your future potential to earn, or provide you with some good of an economic nature. Just like making friends or increasing the accuracy of your model of the world, it has a messy relationship with economic value, although nobody could just flat-out claim that it’s not valuable in any sense.
I shall point you to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs here—defeating akrasia falls into the highest category of the pyramid, “self-actualization”, and poorer folks just have a lot of stuff screaming at them from the lower levels of the pyramid. The choice is between maybe failing and losing money and feeling like shit, or buying some stuff that’s been on your wishlist for a long time or paying off a debt or Omega knows what else.
If you are poor you can just lower the amount of money that you put into the commitment contract to have the same psychological value has the same amount of money has to upper-middle class people.
Obviously it crossed my mind. But my point was that before you answer the question of how much to pledge, you first have to give a certain answer to the question of whether to pledge anything at all. To the latter question, people on LW seem to give a hearty, unambiguous “YES”. That’s what I’m taking issue with. From my (short) experience, it’s like if you even say out loud that no, you don’t think that it’s a good idea for yourself and you aren’t going to try it, people are going to try to pressure you into trying it anyway. Or downvote. Saying “No thanks, I like my money” basically begets the answer “Well then you must like your akrasia too!”. It’s at this point that issues of social class and status rear their ugly head, and you begin suspecting that this isn’t about giving each other good advice in everybody’s best interest, but rich folks wanting to be among other rich folks and using costly means of combating akrasia to indirectly gauge your socioeconomic class.
Now for your actual concern—well, yes, getting rid of akrasia is valuable, but it’s not necessarily economically valuable, in that not all related self-modifications increase your future potential to earn, or provide you with some good of an economic nature.
So you claim that you don’t have any akrasia for activities that would earn you money?
Social confidence that gets trained in the example above is quite useful when it comes to succeeding at job interviews and negotiating for a higher paycheck.
I wouldn’t say that my own social confidence is very low but I know that I would make more money if I had higher social confidence.
To the latter question, people on LW seem to give a hearty, unambiguous “YES”.
I wouldn’t. Some people are practiced stoics who wouldn’t flinch when they lose money. Those people don’t profit from commitment contracts.
On the other hand valuing your money doesn’t result in commitment contracts being useless. It rather should make them work better.
I would also add that not every commitment contract has to be about money. You can do something like clean the flat of one of your friends if you fail your commitment.
There are many ways to find uncomfortable things that you can use as punishment for breaking a commitment contract that don’t involve money.
Are you claiming that you have no akrasia and that getting rid of it isn’t valuable?
If you are poor you can just lower the amount of money that you put into the commitment contract to have the same psychological value has the same amount of money has to upper-middle class people.
Maybe a $10 contract that you take equal a $1000 contract that an upper-middle class person takes.
Well. Am I claiming that I have no akrasia and that getting rid of it (of something I don’t presumably have) isn’t valuable? Did I say anything about the worthlessness of getting rid of akrasia? Not as far as I remember, in fact I think it’s a valuable pursuit. Did I confess to not having any problems at all with akrasia? Why, I think I actually mentioned the contrary somewhere in there. So no, I’m not claiming that! (Not many people are likely to hold that position, so don’t ask that question.)
Now for your actual concern—well, yes, getting rid of akrasia is valuable, but it’s not necessarily economically valuable, in that not all related self-modifications increase your future potential to earn, or provide you with some good of an economic nature. Just like making friends or increasing the accuracy of your model of the world, it has a messy relationship with economic value, although nobody could just flat-out claim that it’s not valuable in any sense.
I shall point you to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs here—defeating akrasia falls into the highest category of the pyramid, “self-actualization”, and poorer folks just have a lot of stuff screaming at them from the lower levels of the pyramid. The choice is between maybe failing and losing money and feeling like shit, or buying some stuff that’s been on your wishlist for a long time or paying off a debt or Omega knows what else.
Obviously it crossed my mind. But my point was that before you answer the question of how much to pledge, you first have to give a certain answer to the question of whether to pledge anything at all. To the latter question, people on LW seem to give a hearty, unambiguous “YES”. That’s what I’m taking issue with. From my (short) experience, it’s like if you even say out loud that no, you don’t think that it’s a good idea for yourself and you aren’t going to try it, people are going to try to pressure you into trying it anyway. Or downvote. Saying “No thanks, I like my money” basically begets the answer “Well then you must like your akrasia too!”. It’s at this point that issues of social class and status rear their ugly head, and you begin suspecting that this isn’t about giving each other good advice in everybody’s best interest, but rich folks wanting to be among other rich folks and using costly means of combating akrasia to indirectly gauge your socioeconomic class.
So you claim that you don’t have any akrasia for activities that would earn you money?
Social confidence that gets trained in the example above is quite useful when it comes to succeeding at job interviews and negotiating for a higher paycheck.
I wouldn’t say that my own social confidence is very low but I know that I would make more money if I had higher social confidence.
I wouldn’t. Some people are practiced stoics who wouldn’t flinch when they lose money. Those people don’t profit from commitment contracts.
On the other hand valuing your money doesn’t result in commitment contracts being useless. It rather should make them work better.
I would also add that not every commitment contract has to be about money. You can do something like clean the flat of one of your friends if you fail your commitment. There are many ways to find uncomfortable things that you can use as punishment for breaking a commitment contract that don’t involve money.