[Radim]

I have not revealed my preference, one way or another (I'm personally not a fan of fakeness, if you must know; which is precisely the reason why I think about such things and take time to reply on HN).

But seeing your visceral response, I'll offer one advice now: don't let your biases blind-side you.

[repomies69]

> I have not revealed my preference, one way or another

You have revealed your preference of evaluating morality as a choice.

I think morality is a basic assumption for pretty much all human interaction. If someone chooses to be immoral, then why would I want to interact at all with that person? If being fake and untruthful is a choice for that person, I don't see how any interaction made sense. Just the only sensible choice is to run away from that person and if you have business going on just try to close them as quickly as possible. Even online discussions like these would be totally pointless with a person who has selected to be immoral/fake.

[Radim]

What you do and whether you "run away" or "close business" is up to you. But likewise, what other people do is up to them – how would you impose your choices and preferences onto others?

You're able to do that only to the degree that you hold power over them. That is what "power" is.

Which is precisely what is being discussed here. Not the personal preferences and animosities of human X (Radim, repomies69, whoever), but how social interactions evolve over aeons. It is a pretty complex dynamic system with feedback loops that span individual interactions (the repeated prisonner's dilemma from my OP), generations and even civilizations.

Let me try another way: You can be perfectly happy with your strategy Y and die content you did what you thought was best. In fact, it's probably the best anyone can hope for. Alea iacta est.

But if you're the last person believing Y, that strategy dies with you. It is not a personal attack on you to observe that there are people who do not follow Y, and evaluate relative merits of strategy Y vs Z. You can wish everyone followed Y (was more like you), and still do that.

Interestingly, lashing out at people who observe other strategies than Y even exist is a strategy in itself. Proselytizing, ostracizing and zealotry are a form of social pressure, and humans evolved to be quite susceptible to that.

On a technical note, "if A then B" is an implication, a form of logical reasoning. An implication doesn't mean that A is true, or that the person proposing the implication believes A (or B). For example, you could say "if everyone is dead, money will be worthless". An implication is an observation about relationships, trying to make sense of the world.

[repomies69]

Thanks for your generous advice, sir. Greatly appreciated.