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John Nash Has Died

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Re: John Nash Has Died

#71

Post by po »

tomjen3 wrote: post #36
po wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does it surprise you at all that I also carried around a set of earplugs on my keychain all through my college years? I highly recommend these as they don't change the audio spectrum very much compared to the foam kind: http://www.etymotic.com/consumer/hearing-protection/er20.htm... I think I just really like low-impact high-reward behaviors. People tend to over-insure for common and minor issues and under-insure for…

You seem a very smart person, any chance I can get a quick list of your other "weird" behaviours?

Thanks for the complement! Hmmm... not easy to think of them. It's not that they're weird, in practice they come off as sounding very normal, but very conservative. I would say the first thing to do is to get to know all of the known cognitive biases surrounding risk because just about all humans suck at it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identifiable_victim_effect

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pseudocertainty_effect

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_compensation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-risk_bias

Actually study all of them... Then after studying those, be sure to study the cognitive bias blind spot so that you don't become overconfident ;-)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias_blind_spot

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases

Also, read Warren Buffett's annual letters to shareholders and try to emulate his approach to risk. I think he's very good at it.

My biggest problem, after becoming more risk-aware is being comfortable taking calculated risks. I often can come off as a bit of a party-pooper. Nothing says "Life of the party" quite like piling into a cab while hopping from one bar to the next and spending the first 45 seconds of a 5 minute cab ride trying to fish a seatbelt out from under your drinking buddy's ass.

I would say other behaviors that could seem odd to some people are:

* Never play lotto, but always buy tickets for local fund raisers or charity giveaways that have desirable prizes. My wife and I won a week long Black Sea cruise at a charity event where tickets were $10 each but I estimate less than 600 tickets were sold.

* Always buy things like renter's insurance (not likely to be used but will wipe you out if you need it and don't have it) but skip things like those insurance policies they offer at the store for non-big-ticket items.

* I stopped worrying about flying but I've become very pro-bicycle even though I don't bike much at all (because I'm a pedestrian and cars are a bigger risk to me than bikes).

* Pick software frameworks and libraries more based on well-trod paths than the new hotness. Avoid the very old and for the very new, wait a bit.

* And finally, on the other hand: I quit my job, moved halfway around the world, and started a startup in a country that is notoriously hard to do business in (Japan). That would seem very risky but it was the sum of a lot of very calculated moves that seemed like good bets when I took them.

There are probably a lot more. I bet you have some too.

Re: John Nash Has Died

#72

Post by _kyran »

po wrote: post #16
msutherl wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm going to start buckling up in cabs now. Same as wearing earplugs at clubs, you might get weird looks, but it's better to be uncool than dead (or living with tinnitus).

Does it surprise you at all that I also carried around a set of earplugs on my keychain all through my college years? I highly recommend these as they don't change the audio spectrum very much compared to the foam kind: http://www.etymotic.com/consumer/hearing-protection/er20.htm... I think I just really like low-impact high-reward behaviors. People tend to over-insure for common and minor issues and under-insure for…

One thing of note with them, whilst they are better than nothing, they are only rated to 12db, I carry a set of them at all times, but also some foam ones (rated at 30db attenuation) to protect my hears when music is 110db plus. (It won't sound as good, but stops my tinnitus from getting worse)

Re: John Nash Has Died

#73

Post by protomyth »

po wrote: post #40
tyfon wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I _always_ buckle up, even in bus. I've gotten looks from taxi drives in south Europe for this, they treat it as an insult. I feel it's better to insult than be dead. Afaik since you get fined quite severely in Norway where I live (and most of Europe) if you don't wear a seat belt, the rate of use is much higher than the US. He will be missed. Hopefully it can put focus on such a simple thing to save lives.

Here's a fun fact: the yellow school busses most North Americans get trucked to school in usually don't have seatbelts. The reason is that they follow a different school of thought regarding safety. The basic idea is that instead of giving everyone seatbelts that unruly kids won't adjust properly and will use to whack each other's teeth out, you make really high padded seats so that in the case of an accident the pas…

Head Start buses now need seat belts or child seats[1]. Of course that is a lower age and they have monitors riding on the bus.

1) http://eclkc.ohs.acf.hhs.gov/hslc/standards/hspps/1310/1310....

Re: John Nash Has Died

#74

Post by aaron-lebo »

slowmovintarget wrote: post #59
DanBC wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's useful to remember that while the extreme libetarian position is mostly American it's a minority position even in America. It overton windows the whole discussion, but most people who don't wear seatbelts are not "Free Men on the land" quoting Magna Carta. They're just not bothered.

I do not think the verbing of "Overton window" conveys the meaning you intend. Did you mean, "it constrains itself to the Overton window?" Or, "it attempts to move the Overton window (up/down)?" Because saying it "overton windows" the discussion is meaningless.

I think he was just saying it incorrectly frames the entire discussion.

Re: John Nash Has Died

#76

Post by rayiner »

ngoede wrote: post #45
po wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in manhattan, the yellow-taxi cab Taxi and Limousine Commission (the TLC I mentioned above) lobbied have an exemption to that law. Same thing with baby carriers. It's illegal to have a baby in a car without a certified car seat, but it's legal in a NYC taxi to just hold them: http://www.nyc.gov/html/tlc/html/faq/faq_pass.shtml#9

This seems insane. Especially the later exception.

It's not. If you're riding in a cab, there's no way you have a baby carrier handy.

Re: John Nash Has Died

#77

Post by axaxs »

I never understand why people don't wear seat belts, even in cabs. I think the thought is that it's the city, you probably won't be going fast. But humans are really bad at judging just how fast they are travelling.

Imagine I asked you to absolutely sprint full speed into a tree while blindfolded. So no time to brace yourself or slow down. You'd probably refuse, thinking this will either hurt very badly or even permanently injure you in certain circumstances. And that is at 12-15mph for most of us. In a car you are going at least twice as fast at all times, and have all sorts of fun objects to break your motion, like steering wheels and dashboards.

Re: John Nash Has Died

#79

Post by simpleigh »

delinka wrote: post #66
po wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's a fun fact: the yellow school busses most North Americans get trucked to school in usually don't have seatbelts. The reason is that they follow a different school of thought regarding safety. The basic idea is that instead of giving everyone seatbelts that unruly kids won't adjust properly and will use to whack each other's teeth out, you make really high padded seats so that in the case of an accident the pas…

We have a local school bus that took a head-on collision at speed (bus traveling 45mph, oncoming pickup at 60mph) and treated the occupants very well. The bus was full of high schoolers, the pickup was driven by another high schooler. The bus driver took a break near the ankle and none of the students sustained anything more than bumps and bruises. Now, a lot comes into play here - the bus outweighs the pickup by sev…

Are you sure the button becomes difficult to use? I might be very wrong here, but I'd at least hope that "release easily even when hanging upside down" might be a design requirement of the average safety belt buckle. Perhaps this is why aircraft belts have very different buckles than car belts? Can anyone provide more detail?

Re: John Nash Has Died

#80

Post by protomyth »

CarVac wrote: post #38
higherpurpose wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why I really like cars which make a sound if you don't have your seatbelt on. That way they don't give you the choice of not wearing the seatbelt and it's how it should be . This is why in such cases I strongly believe governments should force companies to enable something like that. The social norms are stupid and this would give you the excuse to ignore them without giving it a second thought (hey, the car i…

A long time ago there were cars with the shoulder belt attached to a motorized track on the door frame that would pretty much force you to wear it...only for the front seats though. Maybe instead of a power button, cars should turn on when you buckle up after the brake pedal is depressed.

They tried that with a few models and no they shouldn't. It was an actual pain and prone to failure. I had to rewire my friend's car (an all the time seat belt wearer) because of how crappy those things hold up.

People will wear them or not. Making things more complex just means it will fail and make people do strange things.

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