When you get to the future, would you regret having to answer “Yes”, given that if you weren’t so rational you could just answer “No”? If so, you should answer “No” every time. What is the difference between this time and the future? From your present position, you see all future possibilities, and so you make tradeoffs between them, acting on expected utility. But at present, you could similarly take notice of the alternative possibilities that are “sideways” from where you are, things that could happen to you but didn’t, and similarly act on expected utility. There doesn’t seem to be any fundamental reason for discarding (ceasing to care about) possibilities on the basis of not happening to be located within them, it’s just practical to do so since you normally can’t do anything about them.
When you get to the future, would you regret having to answer “Yes”, given that if you weren’t so rational you could just answer “No”? If so, you should answer “No” every time. What is the difference between this time and the future? From your present position, you see all future possibilities, and so you make tradeoffs between them, acting on expected utility. But at present, you could similarly take notice of the alternative possibilities that are “sideways” from where you are, things that could happen to you but didn’t, and similarly act on expected utility. There doesn’t seem to be any fundamental reason for discarding (ceasing to care about) possibilities on the basis of not happening to be located within them, it’s just practical to do so since you normally can’t do anything about them.
(See Counterfactual Mugging and UDT for more discussion.)