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The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

joshuaballoch.github.io

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Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#31

Post by aje403 »

thanatropism wrote: post #8

I still think the focus on wealth/income inequality rather than on absolute poverty is irrational. I've seen people justify it to me on the grounds that people care about relative poverty, which to me reads "people are jealous". But then the result is: 1) A focus on inequality is irrational. 2) People focus on inequality for irrational reasons. This means that if policy-makers and intellectuals fully give in to the p…

I agree with you completely. I got downvoted on a thread several weeks ago for finding issue in the US placing below Mexico on a "(relative) child poverty" measure. Regardless of whether their methodology or even results are correct - I think it's guaranteed that many readers will distort that information and propagate that distortion onward.

But, pardon my cynicism and condescension, but, try arguing that with a group of social scientists/mathematicians doing null hypothesis papers with p-values at 1 SD, as well as with people, who frankly, are jealous of others and want more.

Unfortunately, on the flip side, I think there is still a "how big can my neighbor's house get relative to mine before I consider organizing a mob to break into it and steal all the jewels" element to human nature and society.

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#32

Post by zzzeek »

> There’s a serious risk of this runaway momentum building an ever-growing chain of misguided agreement.

to think we might alter our society to redistribute wealth to those who are most lacking, lifting people out of poverty and improving the world, when we DIDNT EVEN HAVE TO, turns out those losers were talentless and therefore deserve nothing. Horrifying.

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#33

Post by barrkel »

matte_black wrote: post #3

The original model was so abstracted that it was absurd. There is no such thing as “luck”, it is only a name for what we call the intersection of preparation and opportunity. Both can be controlled. People tend to think opportunities are random and based on chance – they aren’t. They are the result of smaller intersections of preparations and opportunities that happened previously.

If someone gets killed in a plane crash, which intersection of preparation and opportunity caused that?

Or was it just bad luck?

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#36

Post by Quarrelsome »

I think generally modelling life in 2d grid with simplifications such as talent = 0.0 - 1.0 and events doubling or halving capital with a deterministic number of "good/bad" events isn't going to give you anything real as output. I don't like this sort of science, it stinks of foregone conclusion. Running the model itself is irrelevant as the outcome is pretty obvious by the maths put into it.

How far is it really from just writing console.out("my hunches are correct!");

Maybe in a future world of modelling where we feed real-world data into the model then maybe we can get somewhere?

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#37

Post by markshead »

pron wrote: post #4
matte_black wrote: post #3

The original model was so abstracted that it was absurd. There is no such thing as “luck”, it is only a name for what we call the intersection of preparation and opportunity. Both can be controlled. People tend to think opportunities are random and based on chance – they aren’t. They are the result of smaller intersections of preparations and opportunities that happened previously.

For the purpose of this discussion, the precise definition of luck doesn't matter, and can be taken to be anything that isn't talent.

So where would you put what we call "determination?" When someone has 9 businesses/jobs/experiments/etc fail and gets "lucky" with the 10th one, it seems like there is another aspect other than luck and talent.

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#38

Post by pron »

thanatropism wrote: post #25
pron wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason we care so much about inequality has nothing to do with jealousy and everything to do with power[1]. As resources are a major source of power (and often vice-versa), and because power is relative, inequality of resources means inequality of power. And as power means influence (and so the ability to reduce another's freedom), inequality reduces overall freedom. As freedom can never be total[2], the question…

This is an interesting answer. But I'm not sure if inequality-of-power-driven-by-inequality-of-wealth can be problematized (put into the discussion and on the agenda) and fought in such a way that equalizes power. We're shuffling power around and the dynamics of power inequality aren't clear at all.

Great inequality of wealth is virtually always an inequality of power, and so it is "problematized". You're right that all social dynamics are complex (even economics, or "the dynmaics of wealth", isn't known to the way it can be effectively controlled), but at the end of the day, policies are made based on values. A society that values the maximization of freedom would fight against growing wealth inequality beyond a point it deems acceptable.

A complicating factor is that, while power is relative, it certainly grows sub-linearly in the absolute baseline. For example, if I have nothing, someone with a few thousands of dollars can have great power over me. But if I have $0.5M, even someone with $1B wouldn't have as much power over me[1]. This is why absolute wealth is also very important, which is why the question of "would we rather have more absolute wealth or less inequality?" doesn't have a simple answer.

[1]: Although it is not true that my own "fuck you" money is enough to completely counteract the richer person's power. For example, their wealth is used to indirectly affect many people, say through political campaign ads, who then change the laws and thus influence me.

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#39

Post by amelius »

mapcars wrote: post #2

I'm not quite getting how can you put talent vs luck, when talent is based on luck you got from your genes, parents, environment etc. I see it as the same thing.

Yes. Therefore, ultimately, in a society without work, wealth should be distributed according to the happiness it delivers. If one person loves reading books and another person loves driving expensive cars, then it's clear how the money should be distributed.

On the other hand, this might take the fun out of driving expensive cars, because in a society with such wealth-distribution, having an expensive car doesn't mean "I'm more successful than you", but rather something like "I have a pathetic need to show off".

Re: The Role of Luck in Life Is Still Misunderstood

#40

Post by dominotw »

thanatropism wrote: post #8

I still think the focus on wealth/income inequality rather than on absolute poverty is irrational. I've seen people justify it to me on the grounds that people care about relative poverty, which to me reads "people are jealous". But then the result is: 1) A focus on inequality is irrational. 2) People focus on inequality for irrational reasons. This means that if policy-makers and intellectuals fully give in to the p…

Same reason we hate google/amazon or any other (almost) monopolies. Money buys speech, power, influence, mind control. There is a reason rich contribute so much to political campaign donations.
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