IMO people grossly underrate the degree to which constantly doing explicit expected utility calculations can help achieve most goals. As a very primitive example, no good chess player would do without assigning point values to pieces. There is room here for a sort of “Benthamite conspiracy” which, like the anti-akrasiac conspiracy but in a different way, aimed toward instrumental rationality. Things like alienation are an issue, but everything is alienating if nobody else does it.
ETA: I may try writing a “techniques of the Benthamite Conspiracy” post. Though actually “Neumann/Morgenstern Conspiracy” would be a better name.
I have attempted explicit EU calculations in the past, and have had to make very troubling assumptions and unit approximations, which has limited my further experimentation.
I would be very interested in seeing concrete examples and calculation rules in plausible situations.
IMO people grossly underrate the degree to which constantly doing explicit expected utility calculations can help achieve most goals. As a very primitive example, no good chess player would do without assigning point values to pieces. There is room here for a sort of “Benthamite conspiracy” which, like the anti-akrasiac conspiracy but in a different way, aimed toward instrumental rationality. Things like alienation are an issue, but everything is alienating if nobody else does it.
ETA: I may try writing a “techniques of the Benthamite Conspiracy” post. Though actually “Neumann/Morgenstern Conspiracy” would be a better name.
I have attempted explicit EU calculations in the past, and have had to make very troubling assumptions and unit approximations, which has limited my further experimentation.
I would be very interested in seeing concrete examples and calculation rules in plausible situations.
Please do.