A genie allows you to choose one of two wishes.

Option 1 (Happiness): the genie will fulfil your every material desire. Wealth, health, power, love, respect, intellect, you'll have it all.

Option 2 (Truth): the genie will tell you the true nature of the universe and existence (and will ensure that you are able to properly comprehend them).

 

Truth. In all likelihood he'd probably tell me some fortune cookie bullshit, but it'd haunt me the rest of my life not knowing.

 

Happiness. I would rather search for the truth than have it handed to me, and having all my material needs taken care of would make that a lot easier.

 

Happiness not close. The "truth" could easily be something that will completely mess you up and make you suicidal, the first option is well much more likely to make you happy.

 

You sure like these.

I think I'd pick number one. I might regret not picking number two later, but I think having a perfect life would be better than knowing the ultimate truth but being unable to do anything about it.

It's tricky, actually. Certainly number two would be better for mankind, if you were able to spread the knowledge you gained and make people believe you. Also, if there's any kind of afterlife, you'd actually know and be prepared for it. Could also lead to some sort of Stargate godlike ascension. But on the other hand, it could be a "giant, cold univerese and you're just a spec of dust, unable to do anything or influence anything" kind of knowledge, which would be pretty depressing. You'd know the truth, it'd be a hard one, and you couldn't do anything about it.

I think I wouldn't be willing to risk it and therefore pick number one.

 

I feel like whichever one you pick you will regret it. If you choose truth, probably it will be depressing as fuck. In a universe where nothing matters, you might as well make yourself as happy as possible. But equally, if you choose happiness, the emptiness of the material things you have will eat away at you, especially as you approach death. All the material things will feel increasingly transient, and you'll wish you had the one thing that could transcend that: the truth.

Ultimately I picked happiness, simply because I suspect the truth would be so empty that you'd kill yourself.

 

This is a silly choice. You pick happiness, because if not knowing the content of the truth option ever makes you unhappy, per the terms of the agreement, the genie would have to provide it. Similarly, if the truth option would make you unhappy in some way, the genie will ensure you never know.

If you pick truth, all you have is truth, no matter how shitty or unuseable it might be.

Get fucked genie. Who's the monkey's paw now, you lamp-dwelling wank-stain?

 

No. It specifically says that the genie only fulfils your material desires. It's happiness in the hedonistic sense of the word, not the eudaimon sense.

 

With the second I could probably get some of the first for myself. If not that, then for others. So truth.

 

Truth.

Normally I’d choose Happiness, but getting everything I want in a finger snap will only bring boredom and depression. I didn’t earn it, so it’s not happiness.

 

Truth. Happiness can be found by oneself, but I'm not so sure that the same applies for the truth. I also debate that it won't make one suicidal, but rather allow them to find a purpose for their life that they find truly meaningful. That is assuming that they can handle the truth hehe.

 

I'm comfortable enough with my lot in life to choose Truth, though with a caveat:

I'm not sure that option 2 is feasible, necessarily, even in principle. It's known that Gödel's work, e.g., makes certain quantum physics calculations fundamentally unsolvable.

It's entirely plausible that some of the deepest, most fundamental aspects of physical reality (e.g., the Yang-Mills mass-gap problem, which purports to explain why the strong and weak forces are so fundamentally different from electromagnetism) may be fundamentally impossible to understand except in the "That's just how our lucky universe is," weak anthropic sense.

 

Happiness, of course. Simply knowing or understanding the truth wouldn't be satisfactory in any way and as a person of humble desires the former would be a lot more suitable.

 

Yeah, happiness for me. I don't think there's much value in finding the truth if you just wish for it. And if I did get sick of material things I could just not wish for them. Like cheat codes in a video game, you just don't use them if you get sick of them. At least if I'm interpreting it right.

 

Not a choice at all. Happiness.

Knowing the truth means little if I'm not Happy. Plus coming off the back of graduate studies I'll be the first to value Happiness at a premium.

 

Was going to pick happiness but- Truth, because knowing the truth would help me base my life around the truth and try an find happiness in the true way.. And if it didn't make me happy I'd know that the truth is, I'd never be able to be happy and that would be true. Having happiness and knowing it might just all be a lie, well that'd be more crushing then knowing and I'd definitely regret not getting to have 'ignorance is bliss' but truly I wouldn't regret it.

 

Truth sounds appealing on the surface, but is there a "true" nature to the universe? Or any meaning other than what we give it?

Sounds like I'd pick that one and the genie would just tell me "No, there's no truth or meaning." Then he would leave.

 

Well, since you list intellect among the material desires under Happiness, couldn't you be happy with sufficient intellect to divine some figment of truth?

Has the genie carte blanche to overwrite reality to accommodate your material desires to reach happiness? What of utility monsters and hedonistic treadmills?

If I desire power strongly enough, will it grant me enough power to coerce the truth out of the genie anyway?

Understanding the true nature of the universe and existence doesn't guarantee that it isn't something people haven't already realized but vehemently deny, or that I'll be able to effectively communicate it to the world for its betterment, or that I won't be killed and discredited by say, religious zealots.

Regardless of my bullshit nitpicking, I'd take door number 1. Material wealth and good health are good enough for me.

 

What does 'material' desire mean? You started with wealth, health, and power, but then added respect and love, which are not material desires?

I would not be happy if I regretted not taking the happiness option, so gimme that!