I couldn’t understand your comment, so I wrote a small Haskell program to show that two-boxing in the transparent Newcomb problem is a consistent outcome. What parts of it do you disagree with?
Okay, I have to admit that that’s kind of cool; but on the other hand, that also completely misses the point.
I think we need to backtrack. A maths proof can be valid, but the conclusion false if at least one premise is false right? So unless a problem has already been formally defined it’s not enough to just throw down a maths proof, but you also have to justify that you’ve formalised it correctly.
In other words, the claim isn’t that your program is incorrect, it’s that it requires more justification than you might think in order to persuasively show that it correctly represents Newcomb’s problem. Maybe you think understanding this isn’t particularly important, but I think knowing exactly what is going on is key to understanding how to construct logical-counterfactuals in general.
I actually don’t know Haskell, but I’ll take a stab at decoding it tonight or tomorrow. Open-box Newcomb’s is normally stated as “you see a full box”, not “you or a simulation of you sees a full box”. I agree with this reinterpretation, but I disagree with glossing it over.
My point was that if we take the problem description super-literally as you seeing the box and not a simulation of you, then you must one-box. Of course, since this provides a trivial decision problem, we’ll want to reinterpret it in some way and that’s what I’m providing a justification for.
I see, thanks, that makes it clearer. There’s no disagreement, you’re trying to justify the approach that people are already using. Sorry about the noise.
I couldn’t understand your comment, so I wrote a small Haskell program to show that two-boxing in the transparent Newcomb problem is a consistent outcome. What parts of it do you disagree with?
Okay, I have to admit that that’s kind of cool; but on the other hand, that also completely misses the point.
I think we need to backtrack. A maths proof can be valid, but the conclusion false if at least one premise is false right? So unless a problem has already been formally defined it’s not enough to just throw down a maths proof, but you also have to justify that you’ve formalised it correctly.
Well, the program is my formalization. All the premises are right there. You should be able to point out where you disagree.
In other words, the claim isn’t that your program is incorrect, it’s that it requires more justification than you might think in order to persuasively show that it correctly represents Newcomb’s problem. Maybe you think understanding this isn’t particularly important, but I think knowing exactly what is going on is key to understanding how to construct logical-counterfactuals in general.
I actually don’t know Haskell, but I’ll take a stab at decoding it tonight or tomorrow. Open-box Newcomb’s is normally stated as “you see a full box”, not “you or a simulation of you sees a full box”. I agree with this reinterpretation, but I disagree with glossing it over.
My point was that if we take the problem description super-literally as you seeing the box and not a simulation of you, then you must one-box. Of course, since this provides a trivial decision problem, we’ll want to reinterpret it in some way and that’s what I’m providing a justification for.
I see, thanks, that makes it clearer. There’s no disagreement, you’re trying to justify the approach that people are already using. Sorry about the noise.
Not at all. Your comments helped me realise that I needed to make some edits to my post.