From: Jef Allbright (Groups@jefallbright.com)
Date: Fri Jun 21 2002 - 16:08:48 MDT
In my opinion it would best to appreciate the new insight about the universe
you inhabit, ask yourself what activities give you personal satisfaction at
this stage of your life, and then continue to pursue those interests.
To me, there's no essential difference between Lee's scenario and the
"scenario" each of us lives in now.
Rage and suicide would have no effect on the simulated universe, just as
they have no real effect on the universe we inhabit now, but you are "free"
to choose them if you wish.
What is this "altruism" that you speak of?
- Jef
----- Original Message -----
From: "Hal Finney" <hal@finney.org>
To: <extropians@extropy.org>
Sent: Friday, June 21, 2002 1:48 PM
Subject: Re: How to tell if you are a nice person
> Lee writes:
> > If you are quite rational, and you are curious about whether
> > or not you are sincerely altruistic towards others, here is
> > a thought experiment that may help you determine the truth.
>
> We did discuss a variant on this in February, 1996, although with perhaps
> a slightly different emphasis. I have many more thoughts about it now.
>
> First I will note is that the concept has a fundamental contradiction.
> Evidentally the experimenters are so powerful, so able to simulate
> human behavior, that they can construct a whole society of puppets
> indistinguishable from human beings. But if that is so, why bother
> to leave one person conscious? And why inform him of the experiment?
> If their goal was to see how someone would react in that situation, their
> tremendous powers of simulation would seemingly give them the ability to
> answer that question without actually having to put someone through it.
> If they already know enough about human behavior to simulate all those
> people in all possible situations the subject might present to them,
> they would know enough to be able to tell what the subject would do.
>
>
> I was skeptical six years ago that you could have people behave so
> realistically without any true emotional feeling behind them. It seemed
> to me that you were in effect calling for zombies.
>
> However since then there has been a good fictional depiction of a
> very similar scenario in the movie The Truman Show. Jim Carrey plays
> Truman Burbank, who has been raised since a child and lived his life
> in an artificially constructed world populated by actors who portray
> the people around him. Christof, the mysterious producer played by Ed
> Harris, has engineered everything that happens to Truman, his childhood,
> his school experiences, going to college, even his falling in love and
> getting married.
>
> As in Lee's scenario, no one is what they seem. Every person Truman
> is dealing with is an actor. Every emotion they project is false.
> Even Truman's parents, his best friend, even his wife, are lying to him
> with every word they say, with every emotion they show.
>
> Truman finally learns the truth of his situation, and he determines
> to escape, giving the film an upifting ending. But in Lee's scenario,
> presumably no escape is possible.
>
> What is the appropriate way to respond in Truman's position, if you
> can't escape? How do you react when you learn that every single person
> you have ever known, people you have trusted, people you have loved,
> have all been lying to you? How can you maintain the facade of a life
> when you know that they are not what they are pretending to be, when in
> fact they know that you know (at least in Lee's scenario), when you know
> that they know that you know, ad infinitum?
>
> In my opinion the only reasonable response on Truman's part would be rage.
> Furious, uncontrolled, violent rage. His whole life has been a lie,
> everyone he has trusted has betrayed him. He is the victim of a cruel
> cosmic joke, carried on by an omnipotent being whom he is powerless
> to influence.
>
> In that situation, I would do everything I could to disrupt the
> simulation, to make it worthless. By doing so I would try to harm,
> however slightly or ineffectually I was able to, the omnipotent beings
> who were responsible for putting me into such a situation. I would rave,
> I would behave erratically. I would tell other people that I knew the
> truth, that there was no point in continuing to pretend. (Of course
> I would have no expectation that they would behave any differently in
> response to such ravings than a person would in our actual world.)
>
> I might withdraw from human company. Rocks and animals may be faked,
> but it is not as disturbing as knowing that every person I see is
> lying to me. I would become a Unabomber, typing manifestos in a shack,
> bearded and ragged.
>
> In the movie, Truman had to face his greatest fears in order to escape
> from his prison. Eventually I think I would do the same, overcoming my
> fear of death in order to seek an escape from the Hell in which I had
> been confined.
>
> Hopefully by taking these extreme acts, I would demonstrate to the Powers
> that experiments along such lines are useless, so that they would be
> less likely to inflict such torment on other helpless beings.
>
> That's altruism.
>
> Hal
>
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