Alice is a horrible sociopathic monster that fakes being good because of the social utility it provides.
Bob is authentically, genuinely a "good" person (however you define it).
If the two are indistinguishable from an outsider's perspective, and arrived at a similar level of social status and "success" (intentionally vaguely defined), the path they got there may not matter to you. At least, it might not at a glance? If you don't think about it too long? Or deal with them for too long?
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Yeah, I think I did hurt my back with that reach.
Even if the external outcome is the same, the direction towards which the person evolves is vastly different. And when lifted out of a narrow thought experiment, in real life, who you are does determine all the great and small ways you behave, and the methods you are willing to employ.
That’s why in the Sermon on the Mount, Christ says “It was said to those of old, you shall not murder, and whoever murders will be liable to judgement. But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgement.”
You will find similar principles expressed in Buddhist teachings, or the Bhagavad Gita, or Confucian ethical philosophy. In this instance, anger on its own is merely a seed. But if left to grow, and it grows by you watering it, then eventually it expresses itself in a much more destructive way.
It could also be that doing good things for selfish reasons creates habits of doing good things, and after a while that is who you are and what you do.
Generally, a period of ambivalence precedes change (most of the time, though there are documented cases of “quantum change” where a person undergoes a difficult change in a single moment without the usual intermediate stages and never relapses).
Ambivalence exists when a person knows in their mind reasons both for and against a change, and gives both more or less an equal mind share.
When that person begins to give an outsized share of their attention to engaging with thoughts aligned with the change, it predicts growing commitment and ultimately follow-through on the change.
The best resource I know of on this topic is “Motivational Interviewing” in its 3rd or 4th edition. It has a very extensive bibliography and the model of change it presents has proven itself an effective predictor of change in clinical practice.
Based on my understanding of that research, I’m inclined to agree with GP.
First, you can trust in the wisdom of those who came before you, i.e. scripture. Second, you could trust in tradition, which may say such things. Third, you can use reason yourself. Fourth, you could rely on personal experience.
If you tend to engage in suspicious behavior, you'll probably start regarding others with suspicion. Essentially, your actions will engender your world view.
On the other hand, the intention behind the habit/action easily twists it in actuality to something else.
I think the “fake it till you make it” I brought up upthread a great example of this. Yeah, it might end up with the fake becoming something valuable, or you building character, or whatever.
Or, the habit that is getting built isn’t positive hustle and tenacity, but just a habit of outright lying, constantly reinforcing itself.
Sometimes it’s impossible to see from the outside what is which until it breaks down.
If you are going to trust someone with important responsibilities, you want them to “show their working” and convince you that that are not faking it.
The difference of course is what Alice and Bob do when the mask is off, when no one is looking.
(No, it doesn't, actually.)
I’ll take someone who consistently does good but without a coherent positive philosophy over someone who talks a good game and behaves badly all day every day.
I think there is some sort brain gymnastic that protects them against the incoherence.
When the outcome predictably is terrible, do we let them off the hook for meaning well?
By your logic, I was heterosexual for my entire young adult life when I actively worked to deceive people from realizing my actual orientation :P
People employ dishonesty for lots of reasons, and in myriad ways. Sure, in this thought experiment, perfect indistinguishability means the difference is inconsequential. But you can use crises as an oracle to observe different behaviors, and thus undermine its indistinguishability.
To keep the cryptography going, this is like an active vs passive attack. Sure, it's IND-KPA, but is it IND-CPA or IND-CCA? Perhaps not!
>actively worked to deceive
that's the contradiction i'm talking about. deception requires effort and planning, it's not just casually doing something. I think that as I explore this I might fundamentally be arguing that saying the same words when you believe them true vs when you believe them false are measurably different, and that the only way for someone to say something falsely in exactly the same way they do truthfully is for them to believe that they're true. You said yourself, you actively tried to deceive people.
As far as using crises to undermine indistinguishability, that was another part of my point: if actions are indistinguishable between two actors we only care about the actors' motivation as an attempt to guess how likely they are to remain indistinguishable. If a crisis causes the two actors to distinguish themselves then, once again, we've undermined the original premise of the experiment.
