AlephNeil comments on Open Thread June 2010, Part 2 - Less Wrong

7 Post author: komponisto 07 June 2010 08:37AM

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Comment author: AlephNeil 09 June 2010 02:32:14PM 1 point [-]

A random thought, which once stated sounds obvious, but I feel like writing it down all the same:

One-shot PD = Two parallel "Newcomb games" with flawless predictors, where the players swap boxes immediately prior to opening.

Comment author: cousin_it 09 June 2010 03:44:43PM *  1 point [-]

Doesn't make sense to me. Two flawless predictors that condition on each other's actions can't exist. Alice does whatever Bob will do, Bob does the opposite of what Alice will do, whoops, contradiction. Or maybe I'm reading you wrong?

Comment author: AlephNeil 09 June 2010 06:34:37PM 0 points [-]

Sorry - I guess I wasn't clear enough. I meant that there are two human players and two (possibly non-human) flawless predictors.

So in other words, it's almost like there are two totally independent instances of Newcomb's game, except that the predictor from game A fills the boxes in the game B and vice versa.

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 09 June 2010 09:14:50PM 2 points [-]

Yes, you can consider a two-player game as a one-player game with the second player an opaque part of environment. In two-player games, ambient control is more apparent than in one-player games, but it's also essential in Newcomb problem, which is why you make the analogy.

Comment author: Blueberry 09 June 2010 07:10:48PM 0 points [-]

This needs to be spelled out more. Do you mean that if A takes both boxes, B gets $1,000, and if A takes one box, B gets $1,000,000? Why is this a dilemma at all? What you do has no effect on the money you get.

Comment author: AlephNeil 09 June 2010 07:20:32PM *  1 point [-]

I don't know how to format a table, but here is what I want the game to be:

A-action B-action A-winnings B-winnings

  • 2-box 2-box $1 $1
  • 2-box 1-box $1001 $0
  • 1-box 2-box $0 $1001
  • 1-box 1-box $1000 $1000

Now compare this with Newcomb's game:

A-action Prediction A-winnings

  • 2-box 2-box $1
  • 2-box 1-box $1001
  • 1-box 2-box $0
  • 1-box 1-box $1000

Now, if the "Prediction" in the second table is actually a flawless prediction of a different player's action then we obtain the first three columns of the first table.

Hopefully the rest is clear, and please forgive the triviality of this observation.

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