I want a description of my expected future experiences; if that means that I have expected variables in it rather than forks in a road, that actually makes it better because the “fork in the road” metaphor is agenty whereas the “random variable” metaphor is uncontrollable.
I can imagine purposes for which envisioning multiple different hypotheticals is useful for decision-making, so I will concede this point. My original opinion was simply that I have different criteria for what makes me sleep better at night than I thought I did, anyway.
Decision-theoretically, what matters is consequences, not experiences.
I’m confused by this distinction. Can you give me an example of an experience that is not a consequence and therefore doesn’t matter decision-theoretically? Can you give me an example of a consequence that is not an experience and therefore matters decision-theoretically?
For example, if you make a decision and then die, there will be consequences, but no future experiences. While future experiences are part of consequences, they don’t paint a balanced picture, as (predictable) things outside experiences are going to happen as well. You can send $X to charity, and expected consequences will predictably depend on specific (moderate) value of X, but you won’t expect differing future experiences depending on X.
It should be description of the world, not description of your experience.
Whence this should? That is my point.
I want a description of my expected future experiences; if that means that I have expected variables in it rather than forks in a road, that actually makes it better because the “fork in the road” metaphor is agenty whereas the “random variable” metaphor is uncontrollable.
For what purpose? Decision-theoretically, what matters is consequences, not experiences.
I can imagine purposes for which envisioning multiple different hypotheticals is useful for decision-making, so I will concede this point. My original opinion was simply that I have different criteria for what makes me sleep better at night than I thought I did, anyway.
I’m confused by this distinction. Can you give me an example of an experience that is not a consequence and therefore doesn’t matter decision-theoretically? Can you give me an example of a consequence that is not an experience and therefore matters decision-theoretically?
For example, if you make a decision and then die, there will be consequences, but no future experiences. While future experiences are part of consequences, they don’t paint a balanced picture, as (predictable) things outside experiences are going to happen as well. You can send $X to charity, and expected consequences will predictably depend on specific (moderate) value of X, but you won’t expect differing future experiences depending on X.
Gotcha! Sure, that makes sense. Thanks.