Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure if your reasoning (sound) is behind the tendency I think I've identified for LW'ers to overvalue simulated selves in the examples I've cited, though. I suppose by population ethics you should value the more altruistic simulation, whomever that should be. But then, in a simulated universe devoted to nothing but endless torture, I'm not sure how much individual altruism counts.

"Totally tangential point" I believe footnotes do the job best. The fiction of David Foster Wallace is a masterwork of portraying OCD through this technique. I am an idiot at formatting on all media, though, and could offer no specifics as to how to do so.