= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
nshepperd comments on Mysterious Answers to Mysterious Questions - 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 (147)
Let's take this a step further. (And for this reply I will neglect all acausal timey-wimey manipulation considerat ions.)
If you know the time of your death you have the chance to exploit your temporary immortality. Play Russian Roulette for cash. Contrive extreme scenarios that will either result in significant gain or certain death. The details of ensuring that it is hard to be seriously injured without outright death will take some arranging but there is a powerful "fixed point in time and space" to be exploited.
If you're the sort of person who would take advantage of such knowledge to engage in dangerous activities, does that increase the probability that your reported time of death will be really soon?
Absolutely. Note the parenthetical. The grandparent adopted the policy of ignoring this kind of consideration for the purpose of exploring the implied tangent a little further. I actually think not actively avoiding death, particularly death by the means predicted, is a mistake.
On the other hand, if you're the kind of person who (on discovering that you will die in a plane crash) takes care to avoid plane crashes, wouldn't that increase your expected life span?
Moreover, these two attitudes - avoiding plane crashes and engaging in non-plane-related risky activities - are not mutually exclusive.