That’s how I interpreted it as well, but I’m not sure the OP is distinguishing the signalling purpose of pre-commitment strategies from mechanisms of pre-commitment..
Reputations of pre-commitment are about signalling credible consequences in circumstances of asymmetric information. When bargaining with oneself, information is about as symmetric as it can get. It’s not like you mistrust your future self’s willingness to go through with getting chicken wings. Any obstacle to getting them is transparent to all parties (you), and shouldn’t impact your future expectation of being able to reward yourself unless you’re staggeringly incompetent at obtaining chicken wings. If that’s the case, you’ll probably factor this in when planning your incentive.
Mechanisms of pre-commitment are a more salient tool when bargaining with oneself over time (cf. dynamic inconsistency ), but only when your goals are inconsistent over time. Post-X you presumably wants chicken wings as much as pre-X you, but is more informed about the cost of obtaining them. There is presumably a level of expense pre-X you would sensibly commit to for the specified reward. If some sort of catastrophe occurred as soon as you’d finished X, pre-X you wouldn’t expect post-X you to crawl through the dust with your one remaining limb muttering “must...get...chicken...wings...”
The issue seems to boil down to “are you staggeringly incompetent at rewarding yourself? If not, don’t worry.”
That’s how I interpreted it as well, but I’m not sure the OP is distinguishing the signalling purpose of pre-commitment strategies from mechanisms of pre-commitment..
Reputations of pre-commitment are about signalling credible consequences in circumstances of asymmetric information. When bargaining with oneself, information is about as symmetric as it can get. It’s not like you mistrust your future self’s willingness to go through with getting chicken wings. Any obstacle to getting them is transparent to all parties (you), and shouldn’t impact your future expectation of being able to reward yourself unless you’re staggeringly incompetent at obtaining chicken wings. If that’s the case, you’ll probably factor this in when planning your incentive.
Mechanisms of pre-commitment are a more salient tool when bargaining with oneself over time (cf. dynamic inconsistency ), but only when your goals are inconsistent over time. Post-X you presumably wants chicken wings as much as pre-X you, but is more informed about the cost of obtaining them. There is presumably a level of expense pre-X you would sensibly commit to for the specified reward. If some sort of catastrophe occurred as soon as you’d finished X, pre-X you wouldn’t expect post-X you to crawl through the dust with your one remaining limb muttering “must...get...chicken...wings...”
The issue seems to boil down to “are you staggeringly incompetent at rewarding yourself? If not, don’t worry.”