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Armok_GoB comments on Influence = Manipulation - Less Wrong Discussion
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Comments (46)
I'd probably say none of the examples are manipulation by any definition I know that doesn't have all of influencing as a subset. By those, manipulation is the kind of thing used for brainwashing prisoners, or uFAI escaping from boxes, or Stanford basilisks, or drugging someone without their consent, or the like.
I have sometimes been described as slightly manipulative by others, and never quite understood why, it sounds like it might be related.
You're probably on the hard-to-manipulate end of the spectrum. Predictions: you don't tend to buy things from fast-talking door-to-door salesfolk, you don't often start liking people who upset you when you're around them, you wouldn't give anyone money or sex just because you'd be embarrassed to refuse. Many people are the other way around.
I can't remember having ever been in any of those situations, but introspective testing (unreliable, but better than nothing) says you're probably right, and roughly analogous situations indicate the same.
... and how the hay do people like that survive? That's just so... exploitable. I consider myself extremely easy to manipulate, but that's in an absolute compsci way and I have no idea how it places me on a curve compared to other humans... If what you're saying is true, then there is a fair (but still not large) chance I could make a working suicide rock!
Good question. A large part of the answer is probably that exploitation is considered manipulation by onlookers, and so potential exploiters (correctly) deem it ethical to refrain, or are punished.
Mass suicides in doomsday cults, and suicide pacts, suggest that it partially works on particularly vulnerable populations.
I suspect that it's often by staying within "safe" social circles in which people don't take advantage of them too hard.
Ok, that's scary... O_o
Not remotely as scary as a whole lot of other things that are also real and I know about. But still pretty scary.
And the thing you mentioned where they try to cooperate dosn't sound like it'd work very well, more like it'd just introduce even further vulnerabilities at least once you take it into account. But maybe it turns out more effective in practice.
Update: I've been playing around a bit with prisoner's dilemma simulations (not particularly ruthless ones). If nice retaliating strategies (like tit-for-tat) rise fast enough, then patches of unconditional cooperation can survive by leaning on them and each other. So it seems to works. My simulation wasn't particularly ruthless, though.
/me is a born sucker... probably