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War prediction markets are a national-security threat

theatlantic.com

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Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#151

Post by mullingitover »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #143
mullingitover wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm still not seeing the lie It’s an absolute howler that the United States would be led around by the nose by a country smaller than New Jersey. C’mon, man. You honestly believe that the massive military buildup that preceded this was just a wild coincidence? If the Israelis were actually pushing the US around in the way we’re supposed to believe in this story the US would absolutely ruin them in a heartbeat. Neta…

Pushing the US to make some kind of decision isn't the kind of "pushing around" that would make the US attack Israel. Your ideas of alternate ways for this to play out have gone from weird to absolutely ridiculous. The US might have already decided it was going to attack, but it just as easily might not have.

I’m sorry but this is simply an unserious argument.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#152

Post by Dylan16807 »

mullingitover wrote: post #151
Dylan16807 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pushing the US to make some kind of decision isn't the kind of "pushing around" that would make the US attack Israel. Your ideas of alternate ways for this to play out have gone from weird to absolutely ridiculous. The US might have already decided it was going to attack, but it just as easily might not have.

I’m sorry but this is simply an unserious argument.

It's plenty serious. You don't like how they acted and how they gave partial explanations so you're calling it an obvious lie even though it's not.

They didn't say it was their absolute only option or something like that, as far as I know. (If they did say that you needed to mention it.) That would have been a clear lie. Saying Israel moved first is just... plausible.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#153

Post by mullingitover »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #152
mullingitover wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m sorry but this is simply an unserious argument.

It's plenty serious. You don't like how they acted and how they gave partial explanations so you're calling it an obvious lie even though it's not. They didn't say it was their absolute only option or something like that, as far as I know. (If they did say that you needed to mention it.) That would have been a clear lie. Saying Israel moved first is just... plausible.

> You don't like how they acted

I don't like having my intelligence insulted by such brazen falsehoods, so in that regard this is true.

I'm happy for your heroic amounts of credulity, it must make life a lot easier in this administration.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#154

Post by Dylan16807 »

mullingitover wrote: post #153
Dylan16807 wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's plenty serious. You don't like how they acted and how they gave partial explanations so you're calling it an obvious lie even though it's not. They didn't say it was their absolute only option or something like that, as far as I know. (If they did say that you needed to mention it.) That would have been a clear lie. Saying Israel moved first is just... plausible.

> You don't like how they acted I don't like having my intelligence insulted by such brazen falsehoods, so in that regard this is true. I'm happy for your heroic amounts of credulity, it must make life a lot easier in this administration.

>> You don't like how they acted

> I don't like having my intelligence insulted by such brazen falsehoods, so in that regard this is true.

Okay I guess I assumed you disliked the stuff you were calling a lie and a moronic cover story.

> I'm happy for your heroic amounts of credulity, it must make life a lot easier in this administration.

It's not that I'm being very credulous, it's that they said very little about their decision process. The claims you're objecting to are relatively minor details about the situation. You keep exaggerating the implications of their claims every time you say why they must be wrong.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#155

Post by Footnote7341 »

pstuart wrote: post #23
Footnote7341 wrote: post #5

Isnt this silly when you can calculate the chance of war in Iran by oil futures instead. Prediction markets are just explicit markers of information that is already being traded on in 100 different ways.

Except this wasn't driven by Oil. It was driven by Israel.

That has nothing to do with the point of my post.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#156

Post by beacham »

whycome wrote: post #110
zer0x4d wrote: post #92

The author spends the first paragraph of the article talking about how n number of users bet x on a specific outcome and they won. They fail to account for the many others who bet on a different outcome and lost. I watched polymarket like a hawk for weeks before the attack and am incredibly familiar with the numbers. Fact is, there were no indications on Polymarket that an attack was happening that morning. The chanc…

I like this post on Reddit/r/MarkMyWords: MMW: The US will strike Iran before March 2nd, 2026 https://www.reddit.com/r/MarkMyWords/comments/1rgjwpu/mmw_th...

Wow. What a post.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#157

Post by jimkleiber »

spiderice wrote: post #65
jimkleiber wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well markets give a huge financial incentive for it. Before you had to get paid a bribe for an intelligence agent. Now you can just "legitimately" bet on a market. It's a LOT easier and more spread out, I imagine.

The existence of banks gives a huge financial incentive to rob them. That doesn't mean we should get rid of banks. It means we should create a huge disincentive to rob them (which we do). Same thing needs to happen to people using national intelligence secrets in prediction markets.

Banks are about saving money and reducing risk. Arguably when they got into high risk investments to make high reward is what contributed to the 2008 recession.

Not sure if banks are the best example of proving the country is not headed towards high risk gambling.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#158

Post by jimkleiber »

metalcrow wrote: post #37
jimkleiber wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but less direct incentive than "If my friends (and I) bet money on X, and I do X, they (and I) make money."

Not by much, plus the volume is much lower on prediction markets, so people with large pockets who happen to be in power and are capable of doing big moves like this would make more money on the oil futures.

Perhaps for people who have large sums of money, they don't tend to play in high risk bets anyways, they don't need to. Large sums make large sums on small percentage movement. Most people don't have enough money to make large sums on small percentage increase, id assume this route makes more sense for like the vast majority of humans, especially the ones who have access to privileged, often government, information.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#159

Post by _menelaus »

DANmode wrote: post #101
_menelaus wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

You think that type of network stays within one administration? Political sex blackmail has been a problem.

This administration seems especially compromised, servile and obsequious. But you're right, both sides of the aisle have been successfully targeted for years. Both sides really don't want the unredacted files to come to light, but Trump least of all.

Re: War prediction markets are a national-security threat

#160

Post by thephyber »

mullingitover wrote: post #67
thephyber wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The White House has admitted that Israel had actionable intelligence that several of the Iranian political leadership were having a physical meeting together and they decided to attack to decapitate the government. The US decided to attack Iranian capabilities preemptively to reduce the inevitable response to US military, embassies, and allies in the region.

It’s bad enough the politicians lied when they campaigned on no more wars in the Middle East, they don’t need to insult our intelligence with these moronic cover stories. If they didn’t want Israel dragging the US into wars they could’ve just placed a call to Iran to warn them.

I see the White House adopting the strategy that the Russian and USSR government / state media use frequently: change the narrative early and often, to the point where people don’t feel like they can ever know the truth.

The downing of flight MH-17 as reported by Russian media was instructive. https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/russian-m...

I also frequently refer back to why Russian language has 2 different words for truth: istina and pravda.

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