I see that the sentence noting how this line of argument comes dangerously close to the Watchmaker Argument for God has been edited out.

Why? If it's a bad point, it merely makes me look bad. If it's a good point, what's gained by removing it?

Z.M., I agree with your analysis up to the point where you suggest that rational agents act to preserve their current value system.

It may be useful to consider why we have value systems in the first place. When we know why we do a thing, we can evaluate how well we do it, but not until then.

I have no idea what the machine is doing. I don't even have a hypothesis as to what it's doing. Yet I have recognized the machine as the product of an alien intelligence.

Are beaches the product of an alien intelligence? Some of them are - the ones artificially constructed and maintained by humans. What about the 'naturally-occurring' ones, constructed and maintained by entropy? Are they evidence for intelligence? Those grains of sand don't wear down, and they're often close to spherical. Would a visiting UFO pause in awe to recognize beaches as machines with unknown purposes?

Z.M., I agree with your analysis up to the point where you suggest that rational agents act to preserve their current value system.

I suggest that it may be useful for you to consider what the purpose of a value system is. When trying to decide between two value systems, a rational agent must evaluate them in some way. Is there an impersonal and objective set of criteria for evaluation?

Suppose I landed on an alien planet and discovered what seemed to be a highly sophisticated machine, all gleaming chrome as the stereotype demands. Can I recognize this machine as being in any sense well-designed, if I have no idea what the machine is intended to accomplish?

I have no idea what the machine is doing. I don't even have a hypothesis as to what it's doing. Yet I have recognized the machine as the product of an alien intelligence.

Carefully, Eliezer. You are very, very close to simply restating the Watchmaker Argument in favor of the existence of a Divine Being.

You have NOT recognized the machine as the product of an alien intelligence. You most certainly have not been able to identify the machine as 'well-designed'.

You can't escape the temptation to lie to people just by having them not pay you in money. There are other forms of payment, of renumeration, besides money.

In fact, if you care about anything involving people or capable of being affected by them in some way, there can always arise situations in which you could maximize some of your goals or preferences by deceiving them.

There are only a few goals or preferences that change this -- chief among them, the desire to get what you want without deception. If you possess those goals or preferences in a dominant form, there's no temptation. If you don't, there's also no temptation, because you have no objection.

'Temptation' only arises when the preference for doing things one way is not stably dominant over not doing things that way.

Personally, I'm doing it mainly because everyone else is (stop laughing, it's an important heuristic that should only be overridden when you have a definite reason).

Most smart people I know think that "because everyone else does it" IS a definite reason.

Information and education should be free

Why? People don't value what they get for free. Education was once valued very highly by the common folk in America. That changed once education began to be provided as a right, and children were obliged to go to school instead of its being a sacrifice on the family's part.

That's very selfish

You say that like it's a bad thing. I am neither a Randian nor a libertarian, but comments like yours push me closer to that line every day.

But a vote for a losing candidate is not "thrown away"; it sends a message to mainstream candidates that you vote, but they have to work harder to appeal to your interest group to get your vote.

Such actions send a lot of messages. I have no confidence in the ability of politicians to determine what I would be trying to convey or the effectiveness of my attempting to do so.

Besides, the point is trivial. A vote for a losing candidate isn't thrown away because the vote almost certainly couldn't have been used productively in the first place - you lose little by casting it for the candidate you prefer, just as you'd lose little by casting it for any of the ones you didn't.

Not voting also sends messages to politicians and your fellow citizens. It is not obvious that they are worse than the ones you'd send by voting.

He quickly appears to conclude that he cannot really discuss any issues with EY because they don't even share the same premises.

So they should establish what premises they DO share, and from that base, determine why they hold the different beliefs that they do.

I find it unlikely that they don't share any premises at all. Their ability to communicate anything, albeit strictly limited, indicates that's there's common ground of a sort.

Was Carl Sagan hawking a religion?

Yes. He was trying to convince people that rationality could substitute itself for mysticism, which they highly value.

Pretty much everyone trying to "sell" an idea dip into religious memes, sooner or later -- as my now-deleted comment makes clear.