[ExI] Next moment, everything around you will probably change

[Lee Corbin]

Russell writes

> On 6/18/07, Jef Allbright <jef at jefallbright.net> wrote:
> > Personal identity is about agency.  Similarity is only a special case.

> my view [is] that for practical decision-making, in cases sufficiently
> different from the ancestral environment that our evolved anticipation
> heuristics aren't useful,

I agree.  I have found them to even be inconsistent.

> it's best to just forget about anticipation altogether, take the expected
> objective state of affairs and apply your utility function. 

Yes.  But you began (here is your whole quote)

> > Personal identity is about agency.  Similarity is only a special case.
> 
> This seems consistent with my view that for practical decision-making...

I don't follow.

Besides, for *practical* decision making, what about the case I just
offered Jef?  Namely, wouldn't you yourself use a "similarity criterion"
in evalutating whether someone was still the same person that they
were yesterday, or whether someone was suffering from MPS?

And if so, then also wouldn't the similarity criterion work for 
determining whether two duplicates were "really the same person"?

Lee