Hopefully_Anonymous3 comments on Possibility and Could-ness - Less Wrong

34 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 14 June 2008 04:38AM

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Comment author: Hopefully_Anonymous3 20 June 2008 03:39:00AM 0 points [-]

constant: buys, eats, etc. Here it's not any more necessary to assert or imply deliberation (which is what I think you mean by saying "choice" is central for economic theory for the person than it is to assert it for an amoeba or for the direction a fire moves. It's true many great scientists informally use "choice" to describe the actions of non-human, and apparently non-sentient phenomena, and I wouldn't see the harm in doing so in an informal sense describing human actions if what I think is appropriate skepticism about conventionally intuitive models of "free will" and human experience of "choice" was maintained.

Sorry if this post isn't more clear. I'm forced to jot it off rather quickly, but I wanted to attempt the timely answer you deserve.