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FeepingCreature comments on Will AGI surprise the world? - Less Wrong Discussion

12 Post author: lukeprog 21 June 2014 10:27PM

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Comment author: FeepingCreature 30 June 2014 12:45:55AM 1 point [-]

In the current context this calls for time discount because we don't want the utility function to be dominated by the well being of those guys.

This is the bit I don't understand - if these agents are identical to me, then it follows that I'm probably a Boltzmann brain too, as if I have some knowledge that I am not a Boltzmann brain, this would be a point of difference. In which case, surely I should optimise for the very near future even under old-fashioned causal decision theory. Like you, I wouldn't bite this bullet.

I think Boltzmann brains in the classical formulation of random manifestation in vacuum are a non-issue, as neither can they benefit from our reasoning (being random, while reason assumes a predictable universe) nor from our utility maximization efforts (since maximizing our short-term utility will make it no more or less likely that a Boltzmann brain with the increased utility manifests).