Strikes me as a bit like saying “once we forget about all the differences, everything is the same.” Is there a valid purpose to this indifference principle?
If you actually did some kind of expected value calculation, with your utility function set to something like U(thing) = u(thing) / causal-distance(thing), you would end up double-counting “ability to have an impact”, because there is already a 1/causal-distance sort of factor in E(U|action) = sum { U(thing') P(thing' | action) } built into how much each action affects the probabilities of the different outcomes (which is basically what “ability to have an impact” is).
That’s assuming that what JonahSinick meant by “ability to have an impact” was the impact of the agent upon the thing being valued. But it sounds like you might have been talking about the effect of thing upon the agent? As if all you can value about something is any observable effect that thing can have on yourself (which is not an uncontroversial opinion)?
Value is something that exists in a decision-making mind. Real value (as opposed to fictional value) can only derive from the causal influences of the thing being valued on the valuing agent. This is just a fact, I can’t think of a way to make it clearer.
Maybe ponder this:
How could my quality of life be affected by something with no causal influence on me?
If you actually did some kind of expected value calculation, with your utility function set to something like
U(thing) = u(thing) / causal-distance(thing), you would end up double-counting “ability to have an impact”, because there is already a1/causal-distancesort of factor inE(U|action) = sum { U(thing') P(thing' | action) }built into how much each action affects the probabilities of the different outcomes (which is basically what “ability to have an impact” is).That’s assuming that what JonahSinick meant by “ability to have an impact” was the impact of the agent upon the thing being valued. But it sounds like you might have been talking about the effect of
thingupon the agent? As if all you can value about something is any observable effect that thing can have on yourself (which is not an uncontroversial opinion)?Value is something that exists in a decision-making mind. Real value (as opposed to fictional value) can only derive from the causal influences of the thing being valued on the valuing agent. This is just a fact, I can’t think of a way to make it clearer.
Maybe ponder this:
How could my quality of life be affected by something with no causal influence on me?