I have found (there is some (evidence)[http://mentalfloss.com/article/52586/why-do-our-best-ideas-come-us-shower] to suggest this) that showers are a great place to think. While I am taking a shower I find that I can think about things in a whole new perspective and it's very refreshing. Well today, while I was taking a shower, an interesting thing popped into my head. Memory is everything. Your memory contains you, it contains your thoughts, it contains your own unique perception of reality. Imagine going to bed tonight and waking up with absolutely no memory of your past. Would you still consider that person yourself? There is no question that our memories/experiences influence our behavior in every possible way. If you were born in a different environment with different stimuli you would've responded to your environment differently and became a different person. How different? I don't want to get involved in the nature/nurture debate but I think there is no question that humans are influenced by their environment. How are humans influenced by our environment? Through learning from our past experiences, which are contained in our memory. I'm getting off topic and I have no idea what my point is... So I propose a thought experiment!
Omega the supercomputer gives you 3 Options. Option 1 is for you to pay Omega $1,000,000,000 and Omega will grant you unlimited utility potential for 1 week in which Omega will basically provide to your every wish. You will have absolutely no memory of the experience after the week is up. Option 2 is for Omega to pay you $1,000,000,000 but you must be willing to suffer unlimited negative utility potential for a week (you will not be harmed physically or mentally you will simply experience excruciating pain). You will also have absolutely memory of this experience after the week (your subconscious will also not be affected). Finally, Option 3 is simply to refuse Option 1 and 2 and maintain the status quo.
At first glance, it may seem that Option 2 is simply not choosable. It seems insane to subject yourself to torture when you have the option of nirvana. But it requires more thought than that. If you compare Option 1 to Option 2 after the week is up there is no difference between the options except that Option 2 nets you 2 billion dollars compared to Option 1. In both Options you have absolutely no memory of either weeks. The question that I'm trying to put forward in this thought experiment is this. If you have no memory of an experience does that experience still matter? Is it worth experiencing something for the experience alone or is it the memory of an experience that matters? Those are some questions that I have been thinking about lately. Any feedback or criticism is appreciated.
One last thing, if you are interested in the concept and importance of memory two excellent movies on the subject are [Memento](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0209144/) and [Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338013/0). I know they both of these movies aren't scientific but I thought them to be very intriguing and thought provoking.
You seem to be objecting that this is an unfair thought experiment because humans were not designed to contemplate these extreme cases.
But that's precisely the point! These extreme cases might not have been present in our ancestral environment. They might not be present now. But there is a decent chance that they are coming...that, someday, we will be literally offered this choice or something analogous to it by a superintelligence AI who, even if friendly, honestly just wants to ascertain our preferences. Perhaps the superintelligent AI can create a utopia for us, but during the week in which it is being constructed by nano-robots, the Earth's surface will be scoured to bits and resemble a living hell. Would we still want it?
That's why this post poses a good, relevant question. And I see that most people seem to just want to squirm in their seats and complain about the tough question rather than answer it.
Me, I would take option 2, assuming that the billion dollars I would get afterwards would enable more than a week of bliss of a magnitude in the positive direction equal to or greater than the magnitude of suffering I would experience for that horrible week.
Plus, no matter how back that first week of torture is, I will know in the back of my head during all of that that I can look forward to a billion dollars at the end of it. Now, if part of the torture involves temporarily deleting my memory of having made the deal and making me confused about why I am being tortured and how long it will last (possibly forever), it would make me think a bit harder about the deal, but I would still take option 2.
You got me wrong. I'm not objecting. The though experiment is a valid and interesting one. It's just that the answers it elicidates fall into a certain class of problems which I pointed out.