Interesting. For me, I tend to normalize top and bottom values, so “a day in heaven” and “a day in hell” cancel each other out. I don’t know where the upper and lower bounds are for either, so I’m just assuming they’re of the same magnitude.
But I also tend to assume, for this kind of extreme situation, that we’re talking about no-consequences pain, which doesn’t leave lasting false beliefs or terrors that interfere with future joy and goal-accomplishment. So when it’s done, it’s done. It may be unimaginably bad in the moments, but it ends and is then normalized to tolerable (if unpleasant) levels in my memory. I don’t know what the similar heaven stipulation would be, as I tend to imagine it as getting stronger/smarter and knowing I can meet more and bigger goals (joy and optimism, not just pleasure). Which, from outside the sim, makes me devalue both heaven and hell compared to reality. Making the whole comparison pointless.
All this to say, I still don’t have a good conception of valuation of joy/pleasure vs pain/despair. I honestly don’t know whether they’re a stock or a flow, nor whether the slope, the peak, or the integral over time is most important.
Interesting. For me, I tend to normalize top and bottom values, so “a day in heaven” and “a day in hell” cancel each other out. I don’t know where the upper and lower bounds are for either, so I’m just assuming they’re of the same magnitude.
But I also tend to assume, for this kind of extreme situation, that we’re talking about no-consequences pain, which doesn’t leave lasting false beliefs or terrors that interfere with future joy and goal-accomplishment. So when it’s done, it’s done. It may be unimaginably bad in the moments, but it ends and is then normalized to tolerable (if unpleasant) levels in my memory. I don’t know what the similar heaven stipulation would be, as I tend to imagine it as getting stronger/smarter and knowing I can meet more and bigger goals (joy and optimism, not just pleasure). Which, from outside the sim, makes me devalue both heaven and hell compared to reality. Making the whole comparison pointless.
All this to say, I still don’t have a good conception of valuation of joy/pleasure vs pain/despair. I honestly don’t know whether they’re a stock or a flow, nor whether the slope, the peak, or the integral over time is most important.