ArisKatsaris comments on Problematic Problems for TDT - Less Wrong

36 Post author: drnickbone 29 May 2012 03:41PM

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Comment author: ArisKatsaris 24 May 2012 08:58:10AM 7 points [-]

Prisoner's Dilemma relies on causality, Newcomb's Paradox is anti-causality.

The contents of Newcomb's boxes are caused by the kind of agent you are -- which are (effectively by definition of what 'kind of agent' means) mapped directly to what decision you will take.

Newcomb's paradox can only be called anti-causality only in some confused anti-compatibilist sense in which determinism is opposed to free will and therefore "the kind of agent you are" must be opposed to "the decisions you make" -- instead of absolutely correlating to them.