Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs

<p>This paper sets out to resolve how agents ought to act in the Sleeping Beauty problem and various related anthropic (self-locating belief) problems, not through the calculation of anthropic probabilities, but through finding the correct decision to make. It creates an anthropic decision the...

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Main Author: Armstrong, S
Format: Report
Language:English
Published: Future of Humanity Institute 2017
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author Armstrong, S
author_facet Armstrong, S
author_sort Armstrong, S
collection OXFORD
description <p>This paper sets out to resolve how agents ought to act in the Sleeping Beauty problem and various related anthropic (self-locating belief) problems, not through the calculation of anthropic probabilities, but through finding the correct decision to make. It creates an anthropic decision theory (ADT) that decides these problems from a small set of principles. By doing so, it demonstrates that the attitude of agents with regards to each other (selfish or altruistic) changes the decisions they reach, and that it is very important to take this into account. To illustrate ADT, it is then applied to two major anthropic problems and paradoxes, the Presumptuous Philosopher and Doomsday problems, thus resolving some issues about the probability of human extinction.</p>
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spelling oxford-uuid:f1a9fafb-2391-4fdc-99c0-96b63c86ba562024-03-15T14:10:22ZAnthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefsReporthttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_93fcuuid:f1a9fafb-2391-4fdc-99c0-96b63c86ba56EnglishSymplectic ElementsFuture of Humanity Institute2017Armstrong, S<p>This paper sets out to resolve how agents ought to act in the Sleeping Beauty problem and various related anthropic (self-locating belief) problems, not through the calculation of anthropic probabilities, but through finding the correct decision to make. It creates an anthropic decision theory (ADT) that decides these problems from a small set of principles. By doing so, it demonstrates that the attitude of agents with regards to each other (selfish or altruistic) changes the decisions they reach, and that it is very important to take this into account. To illustrate ADT, it is then applied to two major anthropic problems and paradoxes, the Presumptuous Philosopher and Doomsday problems, thus resolving some issues about the probability of human extinction.</p>
spellingShingle Armstrong, S
Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs
title Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs
title_full Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs
title_fullStr Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs
title_full_unstemmed Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs
title_short Anthropic decision theory for self-locating beliefs
title_sort anthropic decision theory for self locating beliefs
work_keys_str_mv AT armstrongs anthropicdecisiontheoryforselflocatingbeliefs