RobinZ comments on Advancing Certainty - Less Wrong

34 Post author: komponisto 18 January 2010 09:51AM

You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.

Comments (108)

You are viewing a single comment's thread. Show more comments above.

Comment author: Blueberry 21 January 2010 06:35:33PM 1 point [-]

Very clever! You're right; that is a situation where you might as well play the lottery.

This actually comes up in business, in terms of the types of investments that businesses make when they have a good chance of going bankrupt. They may not play the lottery, but they're likely to make riskier moves since they have very little to lose and a lot to gain.

Comment author: wedrifid 21 January 2010 11:05:32PM 1 point [-]

They may not play the lottery, but they're likely to make riskier moves since they have very little to lose and a lot to gain.

It also applies if you believe your company will be bailed out by the government. I don't tend to approve of bank bailouts for this reason. (Although government guarantees for deposits I place in a different category.)