= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
Alejandro1 comments on Duller blackmail definitions - Less Wrong
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (44)
How about something like this as a definition: There is a "status quo", an outcome for each agent if neither takes any special action, that serves as reference point. Agent B is blackmailing A if s/he announces to A that the status quo is no longer a possible outcome, and the possible outcomes (relative to the status quo) have utilities either "-x for A, +y for B" or "-z for A, anything for B", with z > x. (ETA: typo that said A instead of B corrected in the last line.)
I don't think it is possible to define blackmail without a concept similar to the status quo, as this example I posted in the other thread suggests.
So is robbery blackmail? "The status quo is not to harm or steal. Give me your money, or I will hurt you and take your money." Wouldn't most crimes fall under the same definition?
In fact, isn't the social threat of negative publicity just blackmail against would-be public adulterers? "-affair for A, +prudish satisfaction for Bs" or "-status for A, whatever Bs get out of shaming A". And justice is probably just blackmailing people into being nice against the status quo of natural selection to avoid punishment...
The robbery case is certainly blackmail according to my definition. I agree it sounds strange to call it that way, but I am quite happy to call it "extortion". And I think the distinction between blackmail and extortion in ordinary language (is it that in blackmail the threat must be to reveal information? I'm not sure, not being a native speaker) is slippery and of little theoretical significance.
The other two are not blackmail because the status quo I am talking about is an actual state, vague to define but roughly composed of the reasonable expectations of A before B makes a concrete threat and changes them. It is not a counterfactual "state of nature" in which the public is not scandalized by adulterers and justice does not punish criminals.
Yes, I'm having great trouble defining blackmail without a status quo...
Why is this a problem? I see an obvious status quo in every one of your examples, and if you have to go to such lengths of complication to arrive (or not) at anything doubtful, what does that prove? Look at any border closely enough and it will look blurry. That need not stop us from drawing them.
It's not necessarily a problem, it's an interesting result!