“How it could not be instrumental to preserve any goal...”
The argument is not that goal preservation isn’t instrumentally useful for achieving a goal. Preserving a goal normally increases the probability of achieving the goal. So, preserving a goal can be instrumentally rational, and usually is. The argument is just that abandoning a goal is not instrumentally irrational; instrumental rationality doesn’t prohibit it. Abandoning goal X makes you worse at achieving goal X, yes, but that doesn’t matter instrumentally, because once you abandon goal X, it’s not your goal anymore, so instrumental rationality doesn’t require taking the means to achieve goal X. It’s “the timing problem” because there’s no point at which abandoning a goal is instrumentally irrational.
There are objections to this, but I won’t rehash those here, since this is a linkpost. I’d be interested in your take after you’ve read section 3, if you have a chance to look at it.
Prior to abandoning the goal, abandoning it is irrational. Allowing oneself to deliberately abandon a goal in the future is irrational. I don’t see how what you just said addresses this. I don’t see a valid argument, so I don’t want to read a whole paper on objections to that argument. Your argument addresses the times after abandoning the goal, it does not address all of the times before that at all, as far as I can see.
Thus, your statement that there is no point at which it’s irrational to abandon a goal seems wrong. All actions are initiated before they happen. It’s irrational to initiate the action of abandoning a goal. Like I said, it can happen by accident, but failing to plan to prevent It is irrational.
“How it could not be instrumental to preserve any goal...”
The argument is not that goal preservation isn’t instrumentally useful for achieving a goal. Preserving a goal normally increases the probability of achieving the goal. So, preserving a goal can be instrumentally rational, and usually is. The argument is just that abandoning a goal is not instrumentally irrational; instrumental rationality doesn’t prohibit it. Abandoning goal X makes you worse at achieving goal X, yes, but that doesn’t matter instrumentally, because once you abandon goal X, it’s not your goal anymore, so instrumental rationality doesn’t require taking the means to achieve goal X. It’s “the timing problem” because there’s no point at which abandoning a goal is instrumentally irrational.
There are objections to this, but I won’t rehash those here, since this is a linkpost. I’d be interested in your take after you’ve read section 3, if you have a chance to look at it.
Prior to abandoning the goal, abandoning it is irrational. Allowing oneself to deliberately abandon a goal in the future is irrational. I don’t see how what you just said addresses this. I don’t see a valid argument, so I don’t want to read a whole paper on objections to that argument. Your argument addresses the times after abandoning the goal, it does not address all of the times before that at all, as far as I can see.
Thus, your statement that there is no point at which it’s irrational to abandon a goal seems wrong. All actions are initiated before they happen. It’s irrational to initiate the action of abandoning a goal. Like I said, it can happen by accident, but failing to plan to prevent It is irrational.
If I’m missing something here, please explain?
Yeah, read sections 3.4 and 3.5. These are meant to address your objection here. Especially 3.4. You’re making what we call “the delay objection.”