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JGWeissman comments on Another problem with quantum measure - Less Wrong Discussion
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My point was that under your assumptions, the amount you affect does not increase in time at all, only the amount you do not affect increases.
?
Er no, you can still make choices that increase of decrease utility. It's simply that the measure of the consequences of these choices keeps on increasing.
Suppose you are in a world with measure M and are choosing between A and B, where A results in world WA which includes an immediate effect worth 4 utilons per measure, and B results in world WB which includes a later effect at time T worth 3 utililons per measure. Suppose further that under your not-serious theory, at time T, random quantum fluctuations have added measure 10M to the worlds WA and WB. So your choice between A and B is a choice to either add measure M to world WA or world WB, so that choice A results in WA immediately having measure M worth 4M utililons and later at time T, WA having measure 11M (0 utilons) while WB has measure 10M (worth 30M utilons) for a total of 34M utilons, while choice B results in WB immediately having measure M, (worth 0 utilons), and at time T WA having measure 10M (worth 0 utilons) and WB having measure 11M (worth 33M utilons), so you choose A for 34M instead of B for 33M utilons, for the same reasons that without the non-serious theory, you would choose A for 4M utilons instead of B for 3M utilons. Your non-serious theory should not impact your decisions because your decisions do not control which worlds it adds measure to.
I was envisaging utilons being "consumed" at the time they were added (say people eating chocolate bars). So choosing A would add 4M utilons, and choosing B would add 33M utilons.
My example is entirely compatible with this.
So the problem here is that you are not accounting for the fact that choosing A in the measure M world does not prevent the accumulation of measure 10M to world WB from quantum fluctuation. You get those 30M utilons whether you choose A or B, choosing A gets you an immediate 4M additional utilons, while choosing B gets you a deferred 3M utilons.
A and B could be logically incompatible worlds, not simply different branches of the multiverse.
I am not sure what you mean by "logically incompatible worlds", but if worlds WA and WB are the results of different available decisions of an agent embedded in a common precursor world, then they both follow the same laws of physics and just have their particles or whatever in different places, and in a quantum universe they just have different quantum states.
I may decide to go left or right at a crossroad. If I decide to go left (for good reasons, after thinking about it), then almost all of my measure will go left, apart from a tiny bit of measure that tunnels right for various reasons.
So if I decide on A, WB will exist, but only with the tiniest of measures.
Yes, that is how your decision gives your measure M to world WA or to world WB, but that shouldn't affect accumulation of measure into later states of these worlds by quantum fluctuation, so both worlds still get measure 10M from that.
Unless you mean that quantum fluctuations into later states of the world are directed by the normal evolution of the earlier states, including your decision, in which case, this process would be adding measure (perhaps not quantum measure, but counting as decision theoretic measure in the same way) to the initial state of the world in which you make the decision (because it is another instance of the same causal chain, that is, it produces the same result for the same reasons), so you get all 10M of the quantum fluctuation measure right away, and choice A gives 44M utilons while B still gives 33M utilons.
My model was of gradual proportional increase in utility, not absolute addition to every branch.