Nisan comments on Do Humans Want Things? - Less Wrong

23 Post author: lukeprog 04 August 2011 05:00AM

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Comment author: Nisan 08 August 2011 05:17:58AM 0 points [-]

Some human values are directly about our own sensory experiences (sunshine feels good, loud noises are unpleasant) and some values are about the state of the world (such as the sensory experiences of other people). That our bodies throw away information at the transducer is not a problem for a theory of the values that are about our own sensory experiences.

The big problem for a theory of those values that are about the state of the world is that our brains might not consistently associate objective values to symbolic representations of the state of the world.

Comment author: lukeprog 11 August 2011 12:19:44AM *  0 points [-]

I wrote here:

Suppose you have a neurological disorder that will be cured by a 140-volt electrical shock. If your brain can't encode value for propositions or simulated states of affairs or anything like that, but only for stimuli, then this reference point business I described means that your brain doesn't have the option of encoding value for a 140-volt electrical shock, because it never receives that kind of information in the first place. The transducer discards information about the objective intensity of the stimuli before the signal reaches the brain.

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