Would you agree, Bryan, that incentives mattering is only important if the incentives are reliable over time? An alcoholic can refrain from drinking while you hold a gun to his head, but I can refrain from eating while a gun is held to my head too, and that doesn't imply that I don't need calories, just that I can postpone taking them in…
Would you agree, Bryan, that incentives mattering is only important if the incentives are reliable over time? An alcoholic can refrain from drinking while you hold a gun to his head, but I can refrain from eating while a gun is held to my head too, and that doesn't imply that I don't need calories, just that I can postpone taking them in for some period. Incentives are a test of necessity, but not a perfect one.
You'll eventually die if you don't eat or drink, the alcoholic will survive without alcohol. Mark Kleiman noted that doctors with access to opiates sometimes get addicted, and they way they came up with to treat such doctors was... monitoring with swift consequences for slipping up.
Bad example. In some extreme cases alcoholics genuinely *will* die without alcohol, and the only medically responsible treatment is *less* alcohol than they’ll voluntarily consume on their own rather than *no* alcohol.
Well, that's kinda illustrating the point. Is the actual crux "if going without doesn't, in itself kill you" or is there some level of delayed, non-fatal, or indirect harm that's still sufficient to constitute "need"? Or is literally anything that can be endured/foregone without fatal consequences a preference?
Precisely. Simple hunger and thirst are excellent examples. Not all necessity is immediate or omnipresent. It can be put off, delayed, or temporarily suppressed. That does not make it any less of a necessity.
Would you agree, Bryan, that incentives mattering is only important if the incentives are reliable over time? An alcoholic can refrain from drinking while you hold a gun to his head, but I can refrain from eating while a gun is held to my head too, and that doesn't imply that I don't need calories, just that I can postpone taking them in for some period. Incentives are a test of necessity, but not a perfect one.
You'll eventually die if you don't eat or drink, the alcoholic will survive without alcohol. Mark Kleiman noted that doctors with access to opiates sometimes get addicted, and they way they came up with to treat such doctors was... monitoring with swift consequences for slipping up.
Bad example. In some extreme cases alcoholics genuinely *will* die without alcohol, and the only medically responsible treatment is *less* alcohol than they’ll voluntarily consume on their own rather than *no* alcohol.
Well, that's kinda illustrating the point. Is the actual crux "if going without doesn't, in itself kill you" or is there some level of delayed, non-fatal, or indirect harm that's still sufficient to constitute "need"? Or is literally anything that can be endured/foregone without fatal consequences a preference?
Precisely. Simple hunger and thirst are excellent examples. Not all necessity is immediate or omnipresent. It can be put off, delayed, or temporarily suppressed. That does not make it any less of a necessity.