They tell you that you need to join the Friendly
community for their safety *and* your own self-interest.
Problem is that it doesn't work this way. Maybe they are crazy. They
can't just "tell" that it's not so. You can't even know that they are
"less capable". In real life you don't have Hit Points display
hovering over your head. You need an actual verification of their
makeup, which I can't see how can be done without first taking them
apart and then rebuilding them all over again.
It DOES work *exactly* that way. They tell you exactly what they want to
tell you according to their own self-interest. In the case of Friendliness,
I would even argue that it is true -- but it's "real" truth value is
irrelevant.
You have to then decide whether they are correct or not (note that I said
correct, not truthful -- if they are accidentally correct while they believe
that they are lying, that is just fine/the same for the purposes of this
scenario).
If you decide that they are not correct that it is in your self-interest to
become Friendly, you should feel free to destroy them; however, if they can
stop you, Friendliness says that they *should* charge you enough to make
*all* of your previous UnFriendly actions result in negative utility. This
is a GOOD thing for them (and why they are so happy) since Friendliness
*does* allow them to impinge upon your generic subgoal of money/resources
according to the suggestions/rules/laws of Friendliness.
If they are short on cash *AND* they do have two big buddies on call, it is
*MOST WORTHWHILE FOR THEM* to give you exactly the warning that they have
given you (i.e. that *REQUIRED* by Friendliness) but absolutely no more if
their buddies can stop you before they take too much damage. They and their
buddies will then be the lucky beneficiaries of a lot of your
money/resources. In fact, it is actually *TO THEIR BENEFIT* to lead you to
believe that they don't have buddies and are all alone. So, unless the
fight is going to be close enough that the money isn't worth the bother, a
Friendly society is *NOT* going to tell you about it's buddies -- merely the
potential that it *might* have buddies.
If you're smart in this case, you convert to Friendliness but insist that
you are certain that they have had their transgressions as well and demand
that they reveal them (as *REQUIRED* by Friendly Society). Who knows, maybe
*you* may end up with reparations owed you (well, actually not in your case
since you're not eligible for reparations for actions performed before the
date of your declaration of Friendliness -- but you will be eligible for
reparations for all future UnFriendly actions). In any event, Friendliness
dictates also that you are always allowed to carry the reparations as a
negative credit (against future reparations for being Friendly or pay-outs
from the Friendliness pool) so having reparations due actually doesn't hurt
you at all (you just miss out on future windfalls until you make up the
difference). So, if you convert to Friendliness under these conditions, the
only real "losses" are not being able to destroy the aliens and not being
able to collect future windfalls until your reparations are paid off. And I
(and the Friendly aliens) would argue that the benefits of Friendliness are
far, FAR greater.
Now. there is the *chance* that you can easily destroy them -- but both the
Friendly societies with and without buddies are going to be trying to look
as similar to each other as possible (for money/resources in the with
buddies case and for self-preservation in the without buddies case), so you
are never going to know with any certainty what that chance is *at all*.
Note also that the *next* Friendly alien society is going to attempt charge
you reparations for destroying *this* alien society if you do succeed in
doing so -- so you *are* building up clear, obvious bad karma that WILL hit
you if you *ever* run across a society that is larger than you and they find
out about your past misdeeds.
So . . . . if a *declared* Friendly society points out all of this to you
(as *REQUIRED* by Friendliness) -- What do you do?
(Note: No fair assuming additional "positively correct" information because
Friendly societies are allowed to deceive you about their defensive
capabilities because doing otherwise is not to their self-advantage and
therefore stupid).
-------------------------------------------
agi
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