You're looking at Less Wrong's discussion board. This includes all posts, including those that haven't been promoted to the front page yet. For more information, see About Less Wrong.

NancyLebovitz comments on If you can see the box, you can open the box - Less Wrong Discussion

49 Post author: ThePrussian 26 February 2015 10:36AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (108)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 28 February 2015 03:13:15PM 1 point [-]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/katja-rowell-md/when-feeding-therapy-becomes-aversion-therapy_b_2951294.html

I think there are people who feel a strong impulse to cause pain. Subjectively, it may seem to them that they simply didn't think of a non-pain-causing method of achieving their other ends. For all I know, at least some of them feel causing pain as a relief of anxiety rather than pleasure.

Also, it's possible to frame just about anything as punishing defection. I've been seeing some indications that a lot of bad behavior is punishing people for claiming more status than they are felt to deserve.

Or, for something milder but closer to showing a terminal value, try this.

I'm not sure about this terminal value thing-- if someone is causing pain because they feel pleasure from it, isn't pleasure the terminal value?

Comment author: ChristianKl 06 March 2015 12:34:55AM 0 points [-]

Also, it's possible to frame just about anything as punishing defection.

The question is always whether a given interpretation is useful.

The economist position that defecting in prisoner dilemmas isn't evil but punishing defectors is evil seems wrongheaded to me.