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Newcomb's Paradox and the Direction of Causation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

J. L. Mackie
J. L. Mackie*
Affiliation:
University College, Oxford
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Extract

Newcomb's paradox was first presented by Robert Nozick and has been discussed by a considerable number of writers. You are playing a game with a Being who seems to have extraordinary predictive powers. Before you are two boxes, in one of which you can see $1,000. The other is closed and you cannot see what it contains, but you know that the Being has put a million dollars into it if he has predicted that you will take it only, but nothing if he has predicted that you will take both boxes; you may take either both boxes or the closed one only. The Being has correctly predicted the choices of all who have so far played with him. What should you do?

Let us call the Being the seer, and his opponent the player. I should also like to reduce the amount that may, or may not, be in the closed box to $10,000. Nearly everyone could make good use of $1,000 and better use of $10,000 or $11,000, but it is hard to say whether a million dollars would be a blessing or a curse.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Philosophy , Volume 7 , Issue 2 , June 1977 , pp. 213 - 225
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 1977

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References

Nozick, R. (1969) ‘Newcomb's Problem and Two Principles of Choice', in Rescher, N. (ed.) Essays in Honor of Carl G. Hempel, pp. 114-46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bar-Hillel, M. and Margalit, A. (1972) ‘Newcomb's Paradox Revisited’, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 23, pp. 295–303.10.1093/bjps/23.4.295CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mackie, J.L. (1974) The Cement of the Universe, Chapter 7, ‘The Direction of Causation'.Google Scholar
J., Cargile (1975) ‘Newcomb's Paradox’, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 26, pp. 234-9.Google Scholar