236. Self-Control, Akrasia, & Multiple Self Theory 

Shout out for the 3rd Josh rocking the autonomic nervous system.

The more plausible theory is that control is a non sensical notion and delusional belief. After all, we can't actually choose to not choose what we choose.

Hang in there Short-term Josh. We've got your back.

I am reminded of the discussion of altruism in C.S. Lewis' apologetics. Across several rather impressive leaps of logic, Lewis argues that only the existence of a divine personal being can account for the fact that people are sometimes aware of both an action they want to do, and an action they feel they ought to do regardless of what they want. In my first ever Gemsbok philosophy article back in 2015, I pointed out that the existence of such conflicting drives and feelings of obligation are adequately explained by humans being evolved for both group survival and individual survival. It's interesting how this video breaks that down in even finer detail, as just about every dilemma you've raised here would fall under the purview of individual survival. So it may also be fair to say that humans are evolved to pursue both activities they're convinced will produce short-term flourishing and activities they're convinced will produce long-term flourishing---and that such goals are not always aligned.

Hello Josh, as you have pointed out already, the multiple self theory to me just kinda seems like an extension of Aristoteles Akrasia. Whether we locate the drag of our pleasures in the entity of a part of us, or a complete different entity inside ourselfs does not seem to explain anything further for me. For me it gets interesting when we stretch this thought over to longer periods of time. In a short term scenario, only momentarely pleasures interfere with our reasonable self, but here is then much more to be considered. How can it be, that the me 2 months ago is so radically different in its desires and perhaps even its reasoning and morality than the me making judgements today. A change in such deep and important parts of ourselfs, often triggered by only minor instances, maybe not even a concious ones, I think, this is the phenomenon where an idea of multiple selfs becomes maybe plausible. Still a very interesting thought in this Video and very counterintuitive. Imagining myself to not be a stable form and especially not belonging to one ME is hard to gasp. Maybe because the Idea of Akrasia that Aristoteles and to an extend Freud advocated for shaped my idea of self too much. I will think about this again Thank you for sharing!!

My goal in 2023 was to produce and upload daily short-form content for my education business. A couple of days ago I finished the video for upload on 1 Jan 2024.

Awesome video! I don't think I can unpack all I'm thinking (and researching) right now with respect to the multiple selves theory but I'd just like to point out how we can understand our multiple selves (or, really, the multiple drives that compose our self) as not only a matter of selfhood but otherhood - that is, how others, or projections of these others in our minds, make up who we are as well, since we have other-directed drives too that are quite important in terms of defining our actions

Phone spiked into ottoman at 0:08 😂

Thank you, I didn't know there was a word for the dissonance I feel when I know I should be doing something worthwhile instead of mindlessly watching RU-vid, very informative and interesting

Another theory that I really like that takes into account different aspects of one's personality is Internal Family System. It's also pretty practical! Thanks for the video Josh 😊.

Good video friend. Provocing thoughts regarding self contradiction. Reminds me of a quote by Walt Whitman: "Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.)".

Such an enlightening video especially because of how poor our models for self understanding are given how many people act contradictory to what they say. Anyone know of any good extra readings on this?

I experience this multiple self theory in a lot of ways in my life. As someone who sometimes can't control themselves as this video is about, as someone who believes i should be vegan but isn't because of inferior reasons, but also as a practicing, religious person who thinks as an atheist. dozens of times a day i criticize my religious believes, sometimes to the point of mocking them. It really affects my life in a bad way. I resent people from my own religion who believes wholeheartedly in the things that i also believe but in my mind heavily criticize like for example the existence of hellfire. If i hear someone saying something about hellfire like that it a place for transgressors or something, i automatically resent them even though i believe in that too. It is kind of like a sickness. A sickness of mind of something. I yearn for synthesis between my believes and actions.

Thanks for this video John! I hold it close to my heart as I've been in big on trouble getting things done. I have desire and intention of making many amazing things, but I end up doing nothing I'd planed and spend the day researching and pursuing whatever is it that my brain is interested in that day. I go to therapy weekly and though progress has been difficult, it is still existent. Also, I forgive you for not showing Newton today :P

This was a very good video, thanks as always for making it! I find the argument for multiple selves pretty convincing, for all the reasons you described. Where my mind goes are places that weren't mentioned in the video: they may or may not truly be relevant, I haven't done the research, but I'll share them here. The first is executive dysfunction. I may or may not have ADHD (I'm seeing a therapist and they have given some indications that it's possible) and those with ADHD can suffer from this dysfunction. When you framed the issue as not doing something you knew you wanted to do, it was ringing bells for me. Usually executive dysfunction is framed much more starkly than failing to go for a run, like failing to eat or bathe or get out of bed (it can look a lot like depression, but it can happen even when one is feeling well). Perhaps how it fits is that, those with this dysfunction are even more at the whims of short-term self than long term self? I'd be curious to see these set side by side anyways, though I feel like that requires a study, or at least someone with more medical know how than what I have. The second (to my best attempts at cursory online research for specific terms) is I think Identity Theory. Despite it's rarity, I happen to know 2 people diagnosed with Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), and when you talked about there being multiple selves, I started to relate it to the experiences they've shared with me. Identity theory, as best as I can surmise, is the idea that most of us basically trick ourselves into thinking we have a single identity. By way of the continuity of memory, perhaps some general consistency in desires, we never see ourselves exiting one "self" and re-entering as another "self". Those with DID don't have the luxury, as identities change memories and ability to meet responsibilities changes with them. How it would relate to us without the diagnosis is to try and explain similar challenges discussed in this video, why we seem to change opinions or interests or sometimes struggle or not struggle to remember things, because it's not a single consistent clean and clear identity running everything. I think the Identity model is distinct from the Multiple Self Theory by way of temporality: the long term planning self and the short term deciding self differ by their range of considerations and how long they exist, whereas the Identity model is describing completely different identities sharing or competing for control, where change in "control" can be triggered by all sorts of things, and carries implications beyond just planning or rationalizing. Still, I think both introduce an interesting idea that maybe the truth is closer to our beings being multiple cognitive processes negotiating and competing and aligning or contradicting each other, and we only think of ourselves as a single entity due to habit, or because it works well enough to do so. It seems similar but also different to the Free Will argument: if I feel I have free will, I may as well as like I do. If I feel like I have a single identity/rationalizing self, then I may as well act like I do. Except for all of these examples where we can see that perspective not adding up, the regret and hypocritical nature of our actions. I'd have to think on it more but I am also curious what it would mean to try and plan things, keeping the Multiple Identity theory in mind. One thought I have is it feels like designing with tolerances in mind: you aim for something specific, but expect and account for missing the mark slightly. Maybe it's like, putting a reminder in the calendar, having a playlist ready, having the clothes and water bottle readily available, etc. is something similar to measuring a cut multiple times, from both ends of a bar of metal, with expansion coefficients in mind? I dunno, but I think there's something to planning with tolerances in mind, just have to spend more time on it. Thanks again for the video, lots to think about :)

Consider: Short term Josh gives up control willingly to a conjured expert. This is a result of trying to model humams as an AGI which always has a single terminal goal and many instrumental goals. Layers. Reproduction is terminal. Pain, hunger, fear, etc are evolutionary emergent hard coded instrumental goals sometimes misaligned with reproduction. The ability to predict environment gives rise to modifying environment. The ability to predict self is the source of consciousness and gives rise to self modification (e.g. Exercise) Except that the only layer that isn't hard coded is the final outer layer of brain. So the human is 3 layered advsearial network AI. First runs on cellular chemistry. Terminal goal is persist forever via survival and reproduction. Second AI runs on meta chemistry , doesn't care about reproduction and survival only pleasure pain, and the means to this loosely align it with survival and reproduction. Third AI runs on electricity via neural network. Only cares about maximizing the lifetime long term score of the second AI. These are all only loosely aligned, when they conflict the lower layers turn off the outer layers. The outer layer gets upset when its turned back on to find its goals were violated. In short you can't keep your new years resolution because your resolution has as a prerequisite that the outer layer never gets turned off. Only if you stay at the top of this heiarchy of needs / terminal goals at all time will you be able to keep the resolution.

Great job man! I’ve been following you since 2017

Short Term Josh very probably lives in the massive neural network of the spinal cord and digestive system, he's running the show because he's the one running at the controls.

I think this construction of a 'longterm self' is yet another way to find a 'true self'. By what mechanism are some selves 'longterm' and other 'short term'? Isn't it simpler to say that there are only short term selves that have different desires, some more altruistic (towards both other people and future versions of yourself) and some more egoistic (that screw over future versions of yourself). Also jokes on you, I'm still working on my new years resolution, which was to come up with a real new years resolution.

I think this is another example of how difficult it is to conceptualize consciousness in general and it keeps being divided into Binaries (so popular in the West) like mind/body or reason/flesh or long term/short term selves. It is all part of a complex mechanism that also includes cultural views, environmental characteristics and moral values passed off as personal requirements. Why do people want to run every day? or bulk up at the gym or overoptimize their diets? Running a few times per week can give satisfactory results without the looming shadow of burnout in some cases, some other people do go to the gym as much as they can but not because they have to or it's "good for their health" exclusively. It can be detrimental even, but it can also be good for their health and a hobby in itself and a place for some kinds of social contact. There's that question of why do we consider always optimal the "best interests" of someone and not fulfilling the always optimal list of tasks at all times as "going against our best interests". Not exercising nearly daily can be detrimental, depending on the person, but goign against one's best interests would probably be closer to destructive behaviors, not skipping on maintenance behaviors. All this internal conflict and negotiation and resolution doesn't much feel like antagonistic forces who "win" or "lose" to me, as well, but it feels like the end result of a machinery at work, in which some parts some times work more than others and skew the result some way or the other.

Maybe not on topic but for 36 years I worked jobs as my bosses wanted. When I retired 12 years ago I no longer had much truck with duty! I do as " I" please most of the time. Works for me! 👵🎯

I don't say this too often, but this video might have gained some additional clarity by injecting Spinoza into the discussion. Oh, and thank God (or Nature) for Disco Elysium. Like meditating on less than perfect judgement calls. Your videos are amazing by the way.

I never used to miss an episode of Thunk but I guess at some point it stopped turning up in my feed and I eventually forgot about it. Notification bell clicked now. I like the multiple selves idea but it makes me think about where we draw the line between short term selves - it's a Sorites paradox. Any moment that could be called "now" gives rise to a new short term self. Granted, the current short term self is remarkably similar to the one from now a few seconds ago (we share the intention to write this comment instead of going to bed) but it is different in that my current now is focused on making a different part of this (hopefully) consistent argument. There's a shorter-term long term self that seems to encapsulate the existence of a continuum of short term selves. And this continuum is in opposition to a slightly longer term oriented self that still continues to exert some weight to the option of going to bed. In a way, this continuum is defined by its opposition to that idea in favour of the present goal. If you continue to broaden the scope it is selves nested within selves nested within selves, each definable by a continuity of goals, present circumstances, or both. The self is sort of like a river. The river is similar enough moment to moment to be recognised as the same river, even though from one moment to the next the water at any given point in the river is not the same molecules of water - and despite how the banks of the river will shift over time. The self isn't a consistent, persistent thing, it's just a recognisable pattern.

I've been thinking about it, and I don't think this model changes the moral calculus any. In part, because I think this makes more sense as an abstraction rather than there literally being multiple successive, disposable people. That's a very large claim that would need a suitably rigorous test to make credible, and while I don't think the model is completely unfalsifiable, I'm not sure it's possible to design an experiment with the level of rigor you'd need. Even if you did, we now have short-term people spawning into existence and dying minutes if not moments later, and I'd be much more concerned about finding a way to stop this horrific loss of life than about whether the disposable people share culpability. The other, stronger case is that most versions of morality assume that "person" just means human. Often explicitly, but even nominally species-neutral moral frameworks typically define a person by the traits they associate with humans and not with whatever "non-person" out-group they're trying to exclude from protection. If it did turn out that human are spawning and disposing of short-term people all the time, then "person" would just come to mean "one long-term person and their disposable short-term people", and the long and short sub-people cease being moral agents in their own right. This logic is already often applied to people with dissociative identity disorder, both as a sanity-preserving measure and presumably in most legal contexts, so there's a consistency there.

I would say future discounting is "rational" since there is some chance I will walk under a bus tomorrow and then the longterm value will never exist. All else being equal, prioritize your current self.

The problem with long terms self is usually social constructs versus versus authenticity. Do I really care how my body looks or I do want sex lol etc. Do I pray because I care about suffering or because I want love etc. Do I comment on thunk because I want to feel smart or because my phone owns me lol😂

I have been subscribed to you for a long time, with the notification bell turned on, yet youtube never-ever recommends me your video and therefore I forget ! Please make a trailer real and buy a little bit of advertising in very specific segments

Hold up, this video kinda loops right back to Aristotelian/Christian good vs evil logic. It's basically pitting short-term thinking vs long-term thinking. It settling on multiple selves even jives with polytheistic religions. But essentially the argument is the same isn't it? That we have our animal selves that really can only focus on what's in front of us, in the same way animals "live in the moment", and we have our superior human reasoning that can think ahead and project into the future. We ascribe intelligence to animals when instead of bashing against a problem they think and come up with a multi-step solution that extends into the future. Our reasoning really just enables us to hold a thought in our mind, build on that thought, then hold the resulting thought in our mind while we build further. You've described this process perfectly with the running example. Future vs present is the same as logic vs passion. So I don't see how the multiple-selves contradict the Aristotelian ideas. It seems to me like a step down actually. Consider the Christian notion of sacrifice. You knowingly sabotage your "live in the moment" self to obtain a better result in the future. Your animal brain would love to do young-people stuff like party, but school is important, so you're sacrificing your time and enjoyment in the present in order to allow your reasoning to win out and implement your long-term plans. If the next step in the multiple-selves theory (which in my mind jives with polytheism of old) is to introduce sacrifice into it as a way to override the present-self and benefit your future-self, they would have essentially re-invented Christian philosophy. Which as a Jew somewhat saddens me, not gonna lie, but truth is truth.

10:25 I think the "hyperbolic overcounting" explanation is plausible. People don't really treat numbers linearly. 1 million seconds and one hundred million seconds might as well be the same. Personally I think akrasia is explained by "all of the above". Plato, Aristotle and Multiple selves aren't super-incompatible theories The reason you don't exercise is that you really don't know its value. You haven't experienced the detriments of no exercise, and haven't used exercise to escape that hell. Until then, the benefits of exercise are just an abstract speculation compared to the known joys of disco.

If you have never read Dr. Jonathan Haidt's book "The Happiness Hypothesis," I think that you might find it interesting.

Disco Elysium is so good. Its too bad what events transpired after its success.

Confusing useful abstraction for descriptive reality with nothing in particular backing it.

lol, Sockrates

I don't think you sufficiently motivated why long-term goals shouldn't be inherently favored. Yes, not all long-term goals and values are good, but I think you should err on the side of doing what a long-term value says instead of a short-term value. You seem to have disagreed in this video, instead understanding them as different but not better or worse, but I don't feel like I really understood why.

My pronouns are now we, them.