Quote Originally Posted by kiwiMark View Post
It means exactly that. To lose something means to not have it after the losing, and in this case that wouldn't be the case because there's no more "I" to not have it.

I think you're trying to base your desire to keep on living in logic, which is fair enough but I'm not sure it's possible to do so. Thus far you haven't made any arguments other than saying "it is negative".
Trying a different approach.... Do you value your life, and do you value continuing to live beyond this moment? (I'm going to assume you answer "yes"). Once your life ends, that value drops to 0 -- by definition, there is nothing left to value. So going from "alive" to "dead" means that the value goes down. So, you have to include that loss in that 1% chance of losing when you press the button. Isn't that exactly why you wouldn't press the button? Because you value your life too much to risk it on a gamble?

One more comment -- you can assign a value to a conditional future event, even if that future event is "I will no longer exist, and thus not be able to value anything anymore." The EV of dying is negative-a-lot, because it's expected value -- it's the value you are using to make a decision. Which assumes that you're alive right now to make that decision, and basing that decision on how things are valued to you, at that moment.

I don't know if I'm explaining it well (or if I'm even right) -- but I'm enjoying the discussion