I agree. It seems to me that the speciality of the Necomb Problem is that actions “influence” states and that this is the reason why the dominance principle alone isn’t giving the right answer. The same applies to this game. Your action (sim or not sim) determines the probability of which agent you have been all along and therefore “influences” the states of the game, whether you are X or X*. Many people dislike this use of the word “influence” but I think there are some good reasons in favour of a broader use of it (eg. quantum entanglement).
Actually, when working through it, it looks like pre-nap self was wrong! (Okay no distancing, I was wrong :P). I still wrote up a big comment though, you’ll see what I neglected before.
Short counterargument—if rather than a mild reward, the simulated copies got a horrible punishment, would that change whether you picked Sim when you might be one of those copies? Then because of how utility works the simulated copies always matter.
Actually, upon consideration, I will endorse answering “Sim.” Will explain in a top level comment after nap. But I certainly agree that the resemblance to Newcomb’s problem is why this is interesting.
I agree. It seems to me that the speciality of the Necomb Problem is that actions “influence” states and that this is the reason why the dominance principle alone isn’t giving the right answer. The same applies to this game. Your action (sim or not sim) determines the probability of which agent you have been all along and therefore “influences” the states of the game, whether you are X or X*. Many people dislike this use of the word “influence” but I think there are some good reasons in favour of a broader use of it (eg. quantum entanglement).
Actually, when working through it, it looks like pre-nap self was wrong! (Okay no distancing, I was wrong :P). I still wrote up a big comment though, you’ll see what I neglected before.
Short counterargument—if rather than a mild reward, the simulated copies got a horrible punishment, would that change whether you picked Sim when you might be one of those copies? Then because of how utility works the simulated copies always matter.
Actually, upon consideration, I will endorse answering “Sim.” Will explain in a top level comment after nap. But I certainly agree that the resemblance to Newcomb’s problem is why this is interesting.
EDIT: Whoops, I was wrong.