Imagine a country with two rules: first, every person must spend eight hours a day giving themselves strong electric shocks. Second, if anyone fails to follow a rule (including this one), or speaks out against it, or fails to enforce it, all citizens must unite to kill that person. Suppose these rules were well-enough established by tradition that everyone expected them to be enforced.
I remember when Scott Alexander wrote: “People sometimes confuse me with Scott Aaronson because of our similar-sounding names. I encourage this, because Scott Aaronson is awesome and it can only improve my reputation to be confused with him.”
Indeed, sounds relevant. Though note that from a technical point of view, Scott’s example arguably fails the “individual rationality” condition, since some people would prefer to die over 8h/day of shocks. (Though presumably you can figure out ways of modifying that thought example to “remedy” that.)
Reminds me of this from Scott Alexander’s Meditations on Moloch:
Scott Alexander’s
I remember when Scott Alexander wrote: “People sometimes confuse me with Scott Aaronson because of our similar-sounding names. I encourage this, because Scott Aaronson is awesome and it can only improve my reputation to be confused with him.”
Hilarious… I fixed my error
Indeed, sounds relevant. Though note that from a technical point of view, Scott’s example arguably fails the “individual rationality” condition, since some people would prefer to die over 8h/day of shocks. (Though presumably you can figure out ways of modifying that thought example to “remedy” that.)