To put it bluntly… why should I care? Even if the Mugger’s claim is accurate, the entities he threatens to simulate and calls ‘people’ don’t seem as if they will have any opportunity to interact with my portion of the Matrix; they will never have any opportunity to offer me any benefit or any harm. How would it benefit myself to treat such entities as if they not only had a right to life, but that I had an obligation to try to defend their right?
This is easily remedied: The 3^^^3 people will all be put into the exact same simulated Pascal’s Mugging scenario, and each will be given some previous life experiences that may or may not be like your own, but that the simulated person will assume as his/her own. Their choice won’t actually affect what happens to them, but depending on the original non-simulated person’s choice, they’ll either lead a happy simulated life, or be killed (dependent on the original’s choice, not their own). Overall, 3^^^3 + 1 choices, only one of which counts (the original’s).
Now, you’d have to assume that you yourself are not in the original PM situation, but one of the simulated ones (self sampling assumption). This means that while you’d have to expect your choice not to have any impact (since the original already made the choice that counts), even the tiny probability of being the original would cause you to pay the 5$, counting on TDT reasoning to ensure the best outcome for all simulated muggees—and thus for yourself (Possibly contributing towards not getting killed yourself would outweigh the 5$ you’d expect to be simulated anyways.)
This is easily remedied: The 3^^^3 people will all be put into the exact same simulated Pascal’s Mugging scenario, and each will be given some previous life experiences that may or may not be like your own, but that the simulated person will assume as his/her own. Their choice won’t actually affect what happens to them, but depending on the original non-simulated person’s choice, they’ll either lead a happy simulated life, or be killed (dependent on the original’s choice, not their own). Overall, 3^^^3 + 1 choices, only one of which counts (the original’s).
Now, you’d have to assume that you yourself are not in the original PM situation, but one of the simulated ones (self sampling assumption). This means that while you’d have to expect your choice not to have any impact (since the original already made the choice that counts), even the tiny probability of being the original would cause you to pay the 5$, counting on TDT reasoning to ensure the best outcome for all simulated muggees—and thus for yourself (Possibly contributing towards not getting killed yourself would outweigh the 5$ you’d expect to be simulated anyways.)