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Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

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Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#571

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

maedla wrote: post #439
wolf550e wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The non-consensus outsiders who make progress have done the reading. They know what the consensus is, they know all the concepts and the jargon, and they disagree about something. Your post can be interpreted to mean "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge". That's anti-vax thinking and argument. That is not a way to make progress.

Yep exactly. For every one outsider that gets it right, how many are wrong? I'd wager, quite a bit

Expertise is not a Boolean. I'd trust a qualified physicist to make useful predictions about quantum devices, an EE to model an analog circuit, and a structural engineer to design a bridge that doesn't fall down.

But financiers, bankers, and economists have a much less convincing record - and that's after you filter out the ones who have been caught breaking the law.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#572

Post by mobjack »

uh_uh wrote: post #312
tompccs wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am so sick of this 'stay in your lane' attitude. Time and time again, experts have been shown to have consensus opinions which are wildly off from reality. You can almost set your watch to how often an outsider will analyse a situation from first principles and make money off the 'experts', especially in the stock market. You're welcome to your opinion but this appeal to authority is seriously wearing thin. Pretty…

One could argue that the whole situation came about because outsiders (Reddit users) caught the "experts" (hedge funds) with their pants down.

Market experts have been caught with their pants down many times before because of the actions of uninformed investors.

In 1999, the rational move would be to short tech stocks as they were over valued, but those who tried it lost lots of money because they didn't factor in how crazy investors were at driving up the price.

You can technically be right but still end up losing everything.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#573

Post by [deleted] »

jsmith45 wrote: post #550
willcipriano wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The shorters should form a class action and sue wall street bets, I'm sure a 5 dollar check in 3 years and a year of free stonk advice will cover it right?

Wall street bets is not an organization, and does not really even have a defined membership, and I've never heard of a court case with a class as a defendant. But I suppose that would be a really amusing circus show. Class of shorters vs class of buyers.

[deleted]

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#574

Post by Dirlewanger »

astrange wrote: post #553
chosen1111 wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does medical advice fall into this consensus trap? If so...relative to today?

It is a good example of it, eg anything American doctors would’ve told you about wearing face masks was wrong until it wasn’t (and the CDC director is still telling people not to wear N95s), they still give terrible diet advice like telling diabetics to eat more carbs, and so on. Doctors are quite bad at making reasonable decisions when they don’t have an RCT in front of them.

Yup. Your average PCP/internist is good at one thing: analyzing your symptoms and directing you toward someone who actually can help you.

Not saying that a yearly check-up isn't beneficial (it is), just that they shouldn't be prescribing Type 2 diabetes medications on the spot (and getting kickbacks) and instead should tell the patient to stop stuffing their faces so much.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#575

Post by andrewprock »

mcguire wrote: post #480
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other issue is that it tends to be underspecified whether a discussion is about law or policy. Someone comes in and describes from first principles what a reasonable system would look like, and then someone else haughtily chastises them because that isn't how the existing system works. But if you read it as they intended it, i.e. as a policy proposal rather than a legal opinion, then the fact that it isn't the ex…

On the other hand, many people who reason from first principles fall into two fallacies: First, they believe that their system is how the world should work, and therefore how it would work if only someone, somewhere, weren't interfering. The result is conspiracy theories. Second, they have not fully thought out the consequences, or don't care about them, and dismiss the historical consequences of similar systems in t…

I can only applaud this succinct diagnosis of the difficulty in dealing with online debate.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#576

Post by astrange »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #557
mcguire wrote: post #528

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" how a lot of doctors viewed masks at the beginning of the pandemic " Ok, so I've looked into the history of this a little, and most of the mask mythology seems misunderstood. Prior to 2020, most medical professionals believed most viruses, and corona viruses particularly, could not be transported as aerosols. This was a subject of research where the data had not come in. About late March, it began to appear that th…

My frustration is that, here in Canada at least, there is still an outdated way of talking about the virus as if it's a surface / hand sanitation issue, and much of the public policy (especially around school openings, etc.) still seems to be ignorant of the absolutely essential role that shared air has in transmission. Public authorities have failed to really drive home the reality of the virus, and instead we get s…

It’s possible that it’s just been so long since we had a bad respiratory pandemic that medical advice assumes everything is food poisoning and norovirus, where cleaning surfaces actually does matter.

But it’s also possible they’d have to admit grandma-type adages about opening the windows actually work and office buildings don’t let you do this anymore.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#577

Post by kortilla »

dleslie wrote: post #116
dkrich wrote: post #75

There’s a long history of similar occurrences that follow along a common line: whatever appears to support individual investors will be the path taken by politicians and regulatory bodies. Right now it appears that the public wants to be able to trade on their terms because there is this narrative that the little guy is finally sticking it to the big bad hedge funds. In reality there is probably very little truth to…

The FOMO is palpable. There's a hurried rush of small investors hoping to turn their meagre savings into a big win, backed by the anxiety that if they don't try then they'll forever regret missing their one and only chance at a comfortable life. This sort of event would be less likely if America's wealth disparity weren't so grotesquely skewed.

> This sort of event would be less likely if America's wealth disparity weren't so grotesquely skewed.

Highly unlikely. It doesn’t matter how rich the rich are if you’re poor and want to gamble your way out. The problem is with poverty, which is completely unrelated to wealth disparity.

One you can fix by making life worse for everyone, the other you can fix by making life better for the poor.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#578

Post by egwor »

nvarsj wrote: post #205
sidlls wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is pretty accurate even for many software and tech related discussions here (it’s a big field with lots of specialties).

Yes, it's a reductionist argument that can apply to literally anything. Let's just delete all user discussions on the internet, and only allow PhD granted experts to discuss things on panels where they must provide primary sources for everything. Or you could simply point out when someone is wrong, and explain why, assuming you are an expert. Then we all learn.

I think it would be helpful if folk highlighted when they don't know an area and are not experts. I think this is a better way to do it because it is clear that the person is trying to learn rather than spouting nonsense. Also, it takes a lot of effort to correct people, and when emotions are high this is a painful process. The RH post was a great example of this.

I've commented on some of the RH posts and got downvoted because people didn't like the facts (and I think maybe took it personally too). I've worked in Finance long enough professionally to know that I don't understand this fully and few people do. I do know enough to know when the comments are nonsense though.

I think that some of these issues comes down to respect and also arrogance. Imagine going into a new field and after 30 seconds deciding that you know everything (the Dunning–Kruger effect?)! Have a little bit of respect for those in the field and listen. Feel free to comment/ask, but don't spout 'facts' without checking and I think we'd all move forward faster.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#579

Post by mcguire »

DanBC wrote: post #263
xapata wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a real doctor, nurse practitioner, and the CDC Sadly, many doctors and nurses are statistically illiterate. I know, because I (try to) teach them statistics. Remember, the Surgeon General of the CDC said that, "[masks] are NOT effective in preventing general public from catching #Coronavirus," perhaps in some misguided belief that avoiding panicked mask-buying was more important than a mask-wearing public. [Sorry f…

Can you link to the papers that were available in March 2020 that showed that masks are effective? Use any definition of "mask" and "effective" you want, but preferably effective should include some concept of "prevents spread of respiratory disease". Covid is a serious illness. Far too many people have been told, and believe, that they can continue their normal day to day life so long as they put mask on. This is un…

I've posted links before, and I'll try to find them when I'm not on my phone. But you're right.

It was an open question, but the general opinion before 2020 was that masks would not be particularly useful. Sketchy results started appearing in March with better days in April and May. Several experts said, "we were wrong."

Medical grade masks are very useful. Others are less so. But they primarily prevent you from giving the virus to others.

Re: Statement of SEC Regarding Recent Market Volatility

#580

Post by Izkata »

mcguire wrote: post #537
Tenoke wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw plenty of smart people ahead of institutions and real doctors on masks and to some extents other aspects of the pandemic. Yes, in general if you don't know much on a topic you'd on average do best if you listen to the experts but you can outperform that if you can identify the right kind of smart people with a good track record.

I saw plenty of smart people ahead of institutions and experts on hydroxychloroquine here on HN. They were wrong. Smart people with a good track record are generally called "the experts".

That is the single most frustrating part of the pandemic for me:

* There was preliminary evidence from the experts it might work.

* At some point Trump got wind of this and mentioned it.

* The media, in an effort to portray Trump as wrong, went on a crazy cherry-picking campaign to show HCQ as completely ineffective. "HCQ does not work" was the prevailing sentiment for almost the entire past year because of this, even though evidence was still coming out it does work under certain circumstances.

* Now that Trump is out of office, our understanding of HCQ is shifting back to exactly what that preliminary evidence said that Trump repeated.

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