davidamann comments on The Least Convenient Possible World - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (186)
I think a better way to frame this issue would be the following method.
For example, if I respond to your question of the solitary traveler with "You shouldn't do it because of biological concerns." Accept the answer and then ask, what would need to change in this situation for you to accept the killing of the traveler as moral?
I remember this method giving me deeper insight into the Happiness Box experiment.
Here is how the process works:
Surprising conclusion! Aha! Then you do believe that there is a difference between a happiness box and the real world, namely your acceptance of the existence of other minds and the obligations those minds place on you.
That distinction was important to me, not only intellectually but in how I approached my life.
Hope this contributes to the conversation.
David
I find a similar strategy useful when I am trying to argue my point to a stubborn friend. I ask them, "What would I have to prove in order for you to change your mind?" If they answer "nothing" you know they are probably not truth-seekers.
Namely, the point of reversal of your moral decision is that it helps to identify what this particular moral position is really about. There are many factors to every decision, so it might help to try varying each of them, and finding other conditions that compensate for the variation.
For example, you wouldn't enter the happiness box if you suspected that information about it giving the true happiness is flawed, that it's some kind of lie or misunderstanding (on anyone's part), of which the situation of leaving your family on the outside is a special case, and here is a new piece of information. Would you like your copy to enter the happiness box if you left behind your original self? Would you like a new child to be born within the happiness box? And so on.
The happiness box is an interesting speculation, but it involves an assumption that, in my view, undermines it: "you will be completely happy."
This is assuming that happiness has a maximum, and the best you can do is top up to that maximum. If that were true, then the happiness box might indeed be the peak of existence. But is it true?
Okay, well let's apply exactly the technique discussed above:
If the hypothetical Omega tells you that they're is indeed a maximum value for happiness, and you will certainly be maximally happy inside the box: do you step into the box then?
Note: I'm asking that in order to give another example of the technique in action. But still feel free to give a real answer if you'd choose to.
Side you didn't answer the question one way or another, I can't apply the second technique here. I can't ask what would have to change in order for you to change your answer.
This would depend on my level of trust in Omega (why would I believe it? Because Omega said so. Why believe Omega? That depends on how much Omega has demonstrated near-omniscience and honesty). And in the absence of Omega telling me so, I'm rather skeptical of the idea.
For my part, it's difficult for me to imagine a set of observations I could make that would provide sufficient evidence to justify belief in many of the kinds of statements that get tossed around in these sorts of discussions. I generally just assume Omega adjusts my priors directly.
What if we ignore the VR question? Omega tells you that killing and eating your children will make you maximally happy. Should you do it?
Omega can't tell you that doing X makes you maximally happy unless doing X actually makes you maximally happy. And a scenario where doing X actually makes you maximally happy may be a scenario where you are no longer human and don't have human preferences.
Omega could, of course, also say "you are mistaken when you conclude that being maximally happy in this scenario is not a human preference". However,
This seems to nicely fix something which I felt was wrong in the "least convenient possible world" heuristic. The LCPW only serves to make us consider a possibility seriously. It may be too easy to come up with a LCPW. Asking what would change your mind helps us examine the decision boundary.
Great, David! I love it.