epistemic diffusion

Compiled with AI assistance and selectively reviewed. Please consult the cited passages; the books remain the authoritative source. About this companion

Editorial synthesis · provisional

Definition

Epistemic diffusion is the diminishing predictability of an action’s effects over longer horizons even when causal differences persist. In Askell and Neth’s argument as presented here, sufficiently similar expected far-future contributions can leave nearer consequences decisive without discounting future welfare. The corpus distinguishes this decision-theoretic limit from causal disappearance and from its own further normative commitments.

Explanation

The distinction addresses how far-future differences can guide a present choice, not whether future persons matter. Persistent consequences may outrun justified comparison between available actions. The author accordingly separates the persistence of an effect, evidence for predicting it and reasons for judging it good.

The source expressly keeps Askell and Neth within expected-value reasoning. Their qualification is not a general refutation of longtermism and does not establish that every good is incomparable or immune to aggregation. The separate note on infinite ethical rankings has different assumptions and should not be conflated with predictive uncertainty.

Future responsibility still includes learning and preserving access to valuable possibilities. The book adds a normative requirement of viable, plural and revisable world-making, especially the affected persons’ capacity to contest arrangements. That additional commitment is the author’s argument, rather than a theorem supplied by epistemic diffusion.

Scope and attribution

Retain the Askell–Neth attribution and separate the author’s normative extension.

AB — The Actual Book

The note distinguishes moral importance from predictive guidance and records the argument’s limits.

Occurrence locators: 197; Notes: 249.

RB3 — The Real Book, Volume III: Murmurations

Epistemic diffusion may reduce actionable expected-value differences without erasing causal effects.

Occurrence locators: 263, 264; Notes: 263.

Background used in the editorial explanation

Named theories and mechanisms are distinguished from neighboring background, homonyms and the author’s own synthesis. Reproduced AI passages retain their separate voice.