The way you phrase it, it makes me think this caveat is really the key point. Consider if Omega doesn’t offer that and says this:
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to be tortured continuously for fifty years first.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but I’ll wake up with a speck in my eye everyday.
My intuitive response would be “Don’t pick 50 years of torture, you’ll die!” Which is generally the case. It’s explicitly not the case in the first scenario, because of the “but with no lasting harm.” caveat. But without that caveat, I doubt I would survive 50 years of torture, which means that what would happen afterwards is useless, since I’d be dead.
For instance, imagine if the torture disutility was something like bleeding.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to be lose 50 gallons of blood all at once first.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but one blood cell will be removed from my body every day.
Or alternatively, starving.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to go without food for 50 years first.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but one crumb will be removed from my plate every day.
My intuitive response will successfully allow me to avoid death!
But with the caveat in, your intuitive response consigns you to a greater total inconvenience because it doesn’t quite get the caveat or doesn’t trust the person giving the caveat.
Now, Omega is defined as generating circumstances which are 100% trustworthy. So to properly grasp the question on an intuitive level means you have to intuitively grasp caveats such as “I am certain that I know that I am talking to Omega, Omega is certainly correct at all times, and Omega said I certainly won’t suffer any lasting harm, and I certainly understood Omega correctly when he said that.” Because that’s all stipulated as the fine print caveats in an Omega problem, in general.
If you think to yourself “Well, I’m NOT certain of any of those, I’m just really really sure of them!” and then rerun the numbers, then I think the intuitive response goes back to being correct. I mean, consider the following question where you aren’t certain about that caveat, just really sure:
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to be tortured continuously for fifty years first, but with a 99.99% chance of no lasting harm and a .01% chance of death.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but I’ll wake up with a speck in my eye everyday.
Does this seem insightful, or am I missing something?
So to properly grasp the question on an intuitive level means you have to intuitively grasp caveats such as “I am certain that I know that I am talking to Omega, Omega is certainly correct at all times, and Omega said I certainly won’t suffer any lasting harm, and I certainly understood Omega correctly when he said that.”
My intuitive response would be “Don’t pick 50 years of torture, you’ll die!” Which is generally the case. It’s explicitly not the case in the first scenario, because of the “but with no lasting harm.” caveat. But without that caveat, I doubt I would survive 50 years of torture, which means that what would happen afterwards is useless, since I’d be dead.
Being dead does not seem to fit the description “have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days” with or without the caveat. Instead you should be concerned that the “lasting harm” changes you in such a way that what remains is still ‘satisfied and fulfilled’ but in such a way that you as of now would not consider the outcome desirable or would consider the person remaining after the torture to be sufficiently not-you-anymore.
The way you phrase it, it makes me think this caveat is really the key point. Consider if Omega doesn’t offer that and says this:
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to be tortured continuously for fifty years first.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but I’ll wake up with a speck in my eye everyday.
My intuitive response would be “Don’t pick 50 years of torture, you’ll die!” Which is generally the case. It’s explicitly not the case in the first scenario, because of the “but with no lasting harm.” caveat. But without that caveat, I doubt I would survive 50 years of torture, which means that what would happen afterwards is useless, since I’d be dead.
For instance, imagine if the torture disutility was something like bleeding.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to be lose 50 gallons of blood all at once first.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but one blood cell will be removed from my body every day.
Or alternatively, starving.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to go without food for 50 years first.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but one crumb will be removed from my plate every day.
My intuitive response will successfully allow me to avoid death!
But with the caveat in, your intuitive response consigns you to a greater total inconvenience because it doesn’t quite get the caveat or doesn’t trust the person giving the caveat.
Now, Omega is defined as generating circumstances which are 100% trustworthy. So to properly grasp the question on an intuitive level means you have to intuitively grasp caveats such as “I am certain that I know that I am talking to Omega, Omega is certainly correct at all times, and Omega said I certainly won’t suffer any lasting harm, and I certainly understood Omega correctly when he said that.” Because that’s all stipulated as the fine print caveats in an Omega problem, in general.
If you think to yourself “Well, I’m NOT certain of any of those, I’m just really really sure of them!” and then rerun the numbers, then I think the intuitive response goes back to being correct. I mean, consider the following question where you aren’t certain about that caveat, just really sure:
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days. However, I have to be tortured continuously for fifty years first, but with a 99.99% chance of no lasting harm and a .01% chance of death.
I can have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days, but I’ll wake up with a speck in my eye everyday.
Does this seem insightful, or am I missing something?
Trouble is, I am running on corrupted hardware, and am not capable of being in the epistemic state that the problem asks me to occupy. Pretending that I am capable of such epistemic states, when I am not, seems like a pretty bad idea.
Being dead does not seem to fit the description “have a satisfying and fulfilling life for 3^^^3 days” with or without the caveat. Instead you should be concerned that the “lasting harm” changes you in such a way that what remains is still ‘satisfied and fulfilled’ but in such a way that you as of now would not consider the outcome desirable or would consider the person remaining after the torture to be sufficiently not-you-anymore.