Episode Details

(Subtitle: “And ethics, and epistemology, and…”. Cross-posted from my Substack.)

We want to make decisions for good reasons. But I worry some common approaches to decision theory stray from this purpose. They start with a bottom-line verdict, “I should choose this action”, then use this verdict to justify claims about how to make decisions. While I feel sympathetic to this move at times, I ultimately think it's backwards. And embedding such a move within a more nuanced methodology, like reflective equilibrium, doesn’t make it less backwards.

To see what I mean, take this exaggerated example.

Imagine you ask your friend what they did over the weekend, and they say they went to a casino to play a dice game. You raise an eyebrow. Aren’t they really smart? You ask why they went to a casino.

“It just seemed super intuitive that I should play this game,” they say.

“Oh, huh.” Again, your friend is really smart, so you charitably ask, “So you’ve played it a lot before and know it's profitable?”

“Nah, it was a new game.”

You blink. “Um. I guess this is your trollish way of saying: It seemed super intuitive that you should put equal probability [...]

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Outline:

(04:02) Background: Intuitions as predictors vs. intuitions as normative expressions

(05:35) Background: Winning isnt enough

(06:23) Against verdict-level curve-fitting (and reflective equilibrium)

(11:25) Example: Pascals mugging

(14:30) Example: Smoking Lesion and Twin Prisoners Dilemma

(17:08) Example: Cluelessness

(19:54) So what should we do?

(22:57) Objections and responses

(23:01) Dont our reasons also require further justification, by your standard? And then those reasons, and so on?

(25:29) What if our verdict-level intuitions are tracking good reasons that we cant articulate?

(29:23) Concluding thoughts on further implications

(31:54) Acknowledgments

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First published:
March 17th, 2026

Source:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/GMA975MCt57BQiwXJ/how-to-not-do-decision-theory-backwards

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.