Now, for each of the possibilities in the set, let’s swap the consequences of A and B. The epistemic state then is the following:
Perhaps I’m missing something, but could you explain how this is justifiable? In order to keep it straight in my head, I gave an example to your formula and assumed that, say, action A is letting baby Hitler live, action B is killing baby Hitler, and the “event” consequences are the holocaust. In your first example then, where action A could represent letting baby Hitler live, you are 100% guaranteeing the holocaust (for sake of argument), meanwhile action B could represent killing baby Hitler, thus giving 0% chance of the holocaust (for sake of argument). But I guess I’m not understanding how you can switch these consequences, and assume that somehow, maybe, killing baby Hitler would actually cause the holocaust, and letting him live would prevent it? I guess I just don’t see how the 100%/0% formulation can hold if your argument for allowing the swapping is the unawareness/uncertainty itself. If letting baby Hitler live isn’t a 100% guarantee of the holocaust, then how can we posit it? And if it is, then how could you ever switch that percentage to 0%?
2. Permuting the outcomes of the actions equivalently permutes the probability the agent assigns to those actions.
E.g. if we swap the consequences of actions A and B so that now, for all possibilities in the set, A behaves exactly like B did (and vice versa), then whatever probability the agent assigned to B must now be assigned to A (and vice versa).
Again, I may be missing something, but to me this seems like an equivocation. Does A actually behave exactly like B, or are you just swapping the definition of A and B, and saying that maybe killing baby Hitler could be A, and letting him live B, and therefore the consequences are identical? Sure, it’s true, the naming choices of A and B are arbitrary, but the swapping of consequences, and the set of possible outcomes doesn’t intuitively seem to be. At least, not to me. Maybe I’m missing something?
Action A is whatever action is in the first position, and action B in the second, in whatever list of actions we have. When I say, “let’s swap the consequences of A and B”, that’s equivalent to saying “let’s consider a second scenario, that need not have anything else to do with the first one, except that the consequences of the action in the new first entry are identical to those of the second entry of the original scenario (and vice versa), and the number of actions and sets of outcomes stay the same”. We are considering consequentialists, and, by definition, as far as their decisionmaking procedure is concerned, two scenarios where the actions in each entry have identical (uncertain/unaware) consequences are the same scenario. Though, if it helps, you can imagine we have two buttons, labelled A and B, so that swapping their consequences can be achieved by swapping whatever their cables are connected to.
Perhaps I’m missing something, but could you explain how this is justifiable? In order to keep it straight in my head, I gave an example to your formula and assumed that, say, action A is letting baby Hitler live, action B is killing baby Hitler, and the “event” consequences are the holocaust. In your first example then, where action A could represent letting baby Hitler live, you are 100% guaranteeing the holocaust (for sake of argument), meanwhile action B could represent killing baby Hitler, thus giving 0% chance of the holocaust (for sake of argument). But I guess I’m not understanding how you can switch these consequences, and assume that somehow, maybe, killing baby Hitler would actually cause the holocaust, and letting him live would prevent it? I guess I just don’t see how the 100%/0% formulation can hold if your argument for allowing the swapping is the unawareness/uncertainty itself. If letting baby Hitler live isn’t a 100% guarantee of the holocaust, then how can we posit it? And if it is, then how could you ever switch that percentage to 0%?
E.g. if we swap the consequences of actions A and B so that now, for all possibilities in the set, A behaves exactly like B did (and vice versa), then whatever probability the agent assigned to B must now be assigned to A (and vice versa).
Again, I may be missing something, but to me this seems like an equivocation. Does A actually behave exactly like B, or are you just swapping the definition of A and B, and saying that maybe killing baby Hitler could be A, and letting him live B, and therefore the consequences are identical? Sure, it’s true, the naming choices of A and B are arbitrary, but the swapping of consequences, and the set of possible outcomes doesn’t intuitively seem to be. At least, not to me. Maybe I’m missing something?
Action A is whatever action is in the first position, and action B in the second, in whatever list of actions we have. When I say, “let’s swap the consequences of A and B”, that’s equivalent to saying “let’s consider a second scenario, that need not have anything else to do with the first one, except that the consequences of the action in the new first entry are identical to those of the second entry of the original scenario (and vice versa), and the number of actions and sets of outcomes stay the same”. We are considering consequentialists, and, by definition, as far as their decisionmaking procedure is concerned, two scenarios where the actions in each entry have identical (uncertain/unaware) consequences are the same scenario. Though, if it helps, you can imagine we have two buttons, labelled A and B, so that swapping their consequences can be achieved by swapping whatever their cables are connected to.
Thank you! That does answer my question, I was assuming it was the same or similar scenario.