endoself comments on To what degree do we have goals? - Less Wrong

45 Post author: Yvain 15 July 2011 11:11PM

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Comment author: endoself 18 July 2011 09:00:47PM *  1 point [-]

Those parts of brains hardly act intelligently on such preferences. They are unable to use long-term or complex plans. They are also time inconsistent, which doesn't make them irrational* but does make them bad trading partners.

*Rational time inconsistent agents would self-modify to be time consistent, but humans have limited self-modification abilities. The fact that the unconscious does not try to improve its ability to self-modify is one piece of evidence of its irrationality.