Do you think youâve ever taken an action (or sequence of actions) that, with your current understanding of cluelessness and unwarenesss, should have been ex ante c-preferred to another (or doing nothing, specifically)? Like thinking a bit more about specific backfire risks or cluelessness, or breathing?
EDIT: Also some more weirder things, like not kicking a puppy when given the chance and no one else would know. Or, say, if youâve already stepped on a snail and itâs clearly going to die, should you put it out of its misery?
I think no. Basically, when I really internalize how dwarfed every actionâs cosmic-scale consequences are by off-target effects, ânoâ feels very common-sensical to me. (Cf. this paper on how âsimple cluelessnessâ is fake.)
Do you think youâve ever taken an action (or sequence of actions) that, with your current understanding of cluelessness and unwarenesss, should have been ex ante c-preferred to another (or doing nothing, specifically)? Like thinking a bit more about specific backfire risks or cluelessness, or breathing?
EDIT: Also some more weirder things, like not kicking a puppy when given the chance and no one else would know. Or, say, if youâve already stepped on a snail and itâs clearly going to die, should you put it out of its misery?
I think no. Basically, when I really internalize how dwarfed every actionâs cosmic-scale consequences are by off-target effects, ânoâ feels very common-sensical to me. (Cf. this paper on how âsimple cluelessnessâ is fake.)
I think I wouldnât be clueless about c-preferability in Elliottâs âtrapped in a boxâ example, but canât think of any real-world case analogous to this.
Follow-up assuming youâll answer ânoâ, Anthony: same even ex post, right?