Grit comments on Open Thread, Jul. 27 - Aug 02, 2015 - Less Wrong

5 Post author: MrMind 27 July 2015 07:16AM

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Comment author: Stingray 27 July 2015 06:57:54PM *  1 point [-]

Acknowledges that in a group context, actions have a utility in of themselves (signalling) separate from the utility of the resulting scenarios.

Why do people even signal anything? To get something for themselves from others. Why would signaling be outside the scope of consequentialism.

Comment author: snarles 28 July 2015 01:35:11PM 0 points [-]

Ordinarily, yes, but you could imagine scenarios where agents have the option to erase their own memories or essentially commit group suicide. (I don't believe these kinds of scenarios are extreme beyond belief--they could come up in transhuman contexts.) In this case nobody even remembers which action you chose, so there is no extrinsic motivation for signalling.