It seems to me you use wrong wording. In contrary to the epistemic rationalist, the instrumental rationalist does not “gain” any “utility” from changing his beliefs. He is gaining utility from changing his action. Since he can either prepare or not prepare for a meteoritic catastrophe and not “half prepare”, I think the numbers you should choose are 0 and 1 and not 0 and 0.5.
I’m not entirely sure what different numbers it will yield, but I think it’s worth mentioning.
Why does it sound more like 1 than .5? If I believed the probability of my home getting struck by a meteorite was as high as .5, I would definitely make preparations.
It seems to me you use wrong wording. In contrary to the epistemic rationalist, the instrumental rationalist does not “gain” any “utility” from changing his beliefs. He is gaining utility from changing his action. Since he can either prepare or not prepare for a meteoritic catastrophe and not “half prepare”, I think the numbers you should choose are 0 and 1 and not 0 and 0.5. I’m not entirely sure what different numbers it will yield, but I think it’s worth mentioning.
Why does it sound more like 1 than .5? If I believed the probability of my home getting struck by a meteorite was as high as .5, I would definitely make preparations.