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Matt_Simpson comments on Purchase Fuzzies and Utilons Separately - Less Wrong
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"Utilons" isn't quite the right word: utilons are all I purchase. My utility function is a sum of components: I can decompose it into a local part to do with my happiness and the happiness of those close to me (and thus status, warm fuzzies and the like) and a global part to do with things like the lives of strangers and the future of humanity. I try to strongly mark the boundary between those two, so I don't for example value the lives of people in the same country as me more than those in different countries.
You're saying I can more optimally spend resources on efforts that clearly serve one or the other than on efforts that try to do both and do neither well, and I agree, I'd just phrase it differently: purchase big-picture utility and small-picture utility separately.
Perhaps Eliezer doesn't directly value fuzzies or status, so when he is purchasing them he isn't purchasing utilons directly. Rather, he is purchasing motivation to continue doing things which directly purchase utilons. In other words, he doesn't really want fuzzies, but if he doesn't buy any, he'll lose his motivation to be altruistic altogether. So he buys fuzzies to keep his motivation up which allows him to keep directly purchasing utilons - the things he does actually value. That's at least how I read it.
edit: clarity