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Squark comments on Open thread, Aug. 10 - Aug. 16, 2015 - Less Wrong Discussion
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A question that I noticed I'm confused about. Why should I want to resist changes to my preferences?
I understand that it will reduce the chance of any preference A being fulfilled, but my answer is that if the preference changes from A to B, then at that time I'll be happier with B. If someone told me "tonight we will modify you to want to kill puppies," I'd respond that by my current preferences that's a bad thing, but if my preferences change then I won't think it's a bad thing any more, so I can't say anything against it. If I had a button that could block the modification, I would press it, but I feel like that's only because I have a meta-preference that my preferences tend to maximizing happiness, and the meta-preference has the same problem.
A quicker way to say this is that future-me has a better claim to caring about what the future world is like than present-me does. I still try to work toward a better world, but that's based on my best prediction for my future preferences, which is my current preferences.
"I understand that it will reduce the chance of any preference A being fulfilled, but my answer is that if the preference changes from A to B, then at that time I'll be happier with B". You'll be happier with B, so what? Your statement only makes sense of happiness is part of A. Indeed, changing your preferences is a way to achieve happiness (essentially it's wireheading) but it comes on the expense of other preferences in A besides happiness.
"...future-me has a better claim to caring about what the future world is like than present-me does." What is this "claim"? Why would you care about it?
I don’t understand your first paragraph. For the second, I see my future self as morally equivalent to myself, all else being equal. So I defer to their preferences about how the future world is organized, because they're the one who will live in it and be affected by it. It’s the same reason that my present self doesn’t defer to the preferences of my past self.
Your preferences are by definition the things you want to happen. So, you want your future self to be happy iff your future self's happiness is your preference. Your ideas about moral equivalence are your preferences. Et cetera. If you prefer X to happen and your preferences are changed so that you no longer prefer X to happen, the chance X will happen becomes lower. So this change of preferences goes against your preference for X. There might be upsides to the change of preferences which compensate the loss of X. Or not. Decide on a case by case basis, but ceteris paribus you don't want your preferences to change.