Kingreaper comments on Unpacking the Concept of "Blackmail" - Less Wrong

25 Post author: Vladimir_Nesov 10 December 2010 12:53AM

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Comment author: Kingreaper 19 December 2010 01:04:18AM *  1 point [-]

You answered informally. It's easy, and not what I wondered about.

What did you wonder about? You seemed to be wondering why you shouldn't just go "Well, if they'd done that, the moon would have been made of cheese".

If you can't think about counterfactuals such as "What will happen if I do X?" "What will happen if I do Y?" etc., you can't make rational decisions.

You may wish to dismiss counterfactuals as fantasy, but does doing so help you come to good decisions? Or does it hinder you?

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 19 December 2010 01:21:13AM *  -1 points [-]

The goal is not to dismiss counterfactuals, but to understand where they come from, and how are they relevant for reasoning about the actual world. Distinguish inability to reason informally from lack of formal understanding of the structure of that informal reasoning.

Comment author: Kingreaper 19 December 2010 01:29:56AM 1 point [-]

The goal is not to dismiss counterfactuals, but to understand where they come from,

They are a mode of thought. They come from the thinker.

and how are they relevant for reasoning about the actual world.

They allow you to look at cause and effect. Without counterfactuals, you can't reason about cause and effect, you can only reason about correlation.

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 19 December 2010 01:46:54AM -1 points [-]

Taboo cause, effect, taboo counterfactuals. That something is, doesn't answer why it's normatively useful ("they come from the thinker").

Comment author: Kingreaper 19 December 2010 01:56:24AM *  2 points [-]

Taboo cause, effect, taboo counterfactuals.

Okay: Thinking about how things would differ now, or in future, based on a slightly modified version of the past, allows us to accurately consider what the world could be like, in the future, based on our options in the present.

That something is, doesn't answer why it's normatively useful ("they come from the thinker").

You said you sought to understand where they came from. That they come from the thinker is an answer to that. I answered how they're relevant in the second part of the post (and the first part of this one)

Comment author: Vladimir_Nesov 19 December 2010 02:04:39AM -1 points [-]

You ignore these points and repeat something contradictory to them, which is wrong in a debate even if you don't accept them. You (or I) need to find another path, and not rehash the same ground.

Comment author: Kingreaper 19 December 2010 02:26:43AM *  2 points [-]

Okay, I'll go point to point, and try and understand what you meant in that post, that you think I'm ignoring.

Things don't change.

This is simply false, as a statement, so I won't treat it on it's own.

When you make a decision, you are not changing the future, you are deciding the future.

This is fine. Sure. My post works fine within such a structure.

The future is what it is given your actual decision,

True. But making choices requires that one accept that one doesn't know what the future is, nor does one know what one's decision will be. It requires the use of "if... then" thoughts, or counterfactuals.

So, nope, not ignored, just irrelevant.

all else is fantasy

Emotional dismissal, not an actual point.

(logically inconsistent even, because the structure of your own mind implies only one decision, when you ignore some unimportant cognitive noise)

A good counterfactual should be logically consistent. It isn't the real world, but the real world isn't the only logically consistent possible world.

Perhaps you're making the same mistake as you made with the term "logically impossible" earlier?

perhaps morally important fantasy whose structure we ought to understand, but still not the reality.

Dismissal, not an actual point.

EDIT: So, which of those are you claiming I contradicted exactly?