Okay, well, what would such a strong desire feel like, do you think? I take it you say you have an absence of such a desire because something is lacking where you expect it should be if you had the desire. What is that?
Yes, I feel I know what it is to want something. I’m very good at wanting e.g. alcohol, cigarettes, food, intellectual satisfaction, and glory on the cricket field. And I don’t feel that sort of desire towards ‘future existence’.
I mean, I think that if I was told that I had a terminal cancer tomorrow, that I’d just calmly start making preparations for a cryonics-friendly suicide, and not worry about it too much. Even though I think that the chances of cryonics actually working are minute.
Whereas I’m pretty sure that if I get out for a duck in tomorrow’s cricket match, that I’ll feel utterly wretched for at least half an hour, even though it won’t matter in the slightest in the grander scheme of things.
And yet, were someone to offer me the choice of ‘duck or death’, of course I’d take the duck.
It’s really weird. I feel like I somehow fail to identify with my possible future selves over more than about a week or so. I’ve tried most vices and not worried about the consequences much. And yet I never did do myself serious harm, and a few years ago I stopped riding motorcycles because I got scared.
It’s as though someone who is not me is taking a lot of my decisions for me, and he’s more cautious and more long-termist than me.
I don’t feel that sort of desire towards ‘future existence’.
It sounds as if you use the words “desire” in two different senses—concrete, gut-level craving on the one hand, vs abstract, making-plans recognition of long-term value on the other hand.
That doesn’t sound so unusual—I don’t, for instance, feel a burning desire to be alive tomorrow—most of the time. I’m pretty sure that if someone had a gun on me and demanded I hand over my last jar of fig jam, that desire would suddenly develop. But in general, I’m confident anyway that I’ll still be here tomorrow.
Hypothesis: desire is usually abstract, in particular when the object of desire is a given, but becomes a feeling when that object is denied or about to be denied.
(I’m rather doubtful that most animals experience “desires” that conform to this dynamic.)
Well, it makes sense to me that future time can’t really be an object of desire all on its lonesome. People have spent time trying to work out what is being feared when we fear death, or what is being desired when we desire to live longer. A very common strategy is to say that what we fear is the loss of future goods, or the cancelation of present projects, and what we desire are future goods or the completion of present projects.
So in a sense, I think I’m right there with you in wanting (in some kind of preference ordering way) to live longer, but without having any real phenomenal desire to live longer.
Okay, well, what would such a strong desire feel like, do you think? I take it you say you have an absence of such a desire because something is lacking where you expect it should be if you had the desire. What is that?
Yes, I feel I know what it is to want something. I’m very good at wanting e.g. alcohol, cigarettes, food, intellectual satisfaction, and glory on the cricket field. And I don’t feel that sort of desire towards ‘future existence’.
I mean, I think that if I was told that I had a terminal cancer tomorrow, that I’d just calmly start making preparations for a cryonics-friendly suicide, and not worry about it too much. Even though I think that the chances of cryonics actually working are minute.
Whereas I’m pretty sure that if I get out for a duck in tomorrow’s cricket match, that I’ll feel utterly wretched for at least half an hour, even though it won’t matter in the slightest in the grander scheme of things.
And yet, were someone to offer me the choice of ‘duck or death’, of course I’d take the duck.
It’s really weird. I feel like I somehow fail to identify with my possible future selves over more than about a week or so. I’ve tried most vices and not worried about the consequences much. And yet I never did do myself serious harm, and a few years ago I stopped riding motorcycles because I got scared.
It’s as though someone who is not me is taking a lot of my decisions for me, and he’s more cautious and more long-termist than me.
It sounds as if you use the words “desire” in two different senses—concrete, gut-level craving on the one hand, vs abstract, making-plans recognition of long-term value on the other hand.
That doesn’t sound so unusual—I don’t, for instance, feel a burning desire to be alive tomorrow—most of the time. I’m pretty sure that if someone had a gun on me and demanded I hand over my last jar of fig jam, that desire would suddenly develop. But in general, I’m confident anyway that I’ll still be here tomorrow.
Hypothesis: desire is usually abstract, in particular when the object of desire is a given, but becomes a feeling when that object is denied or about to be denied.
(I’m rather doubtful that most animals experience “desires” that conform to this dynamic.)
Well, it makes sense to me that future time can’t really be an object of desire all on its lonesome. People have spent time trying to work out what is being feared when we fear death, or what is being desired when we desire to live longer. A very common strategy is to say that what we fear is the loss of future goods, or the cancelation of present projects, and what we desire are future goods or the completion of present projects.
So in a sense, I think I’m right there with you in wanting (in some kind of preference ordering way) to live longer, but without having any real phenomenal desire to live longer.