Rationality Quotes: June 2011

Oscar_Cunningham

Y'all know the rules:

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
Do not quote yourself.
Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB.
No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.

Y'all know the rules:

Please post all quotes separately, so that they can be voted up/down separately. (If they are strongly related, reply to your own comments. If strongly ordered, then go ahead and post them together.)
Do not quote yourself.
Do not quote comments/posts on LW/OB.
No more than 5 quotes per person per monthly thread, please.

I care. If illness is abolished and a doctor of any age is starving, they can stay at my place and I'll feed them. Alternately, we could raise taxes slightly to finance government-mandated programs for training and reconversion of young doctors and early retirement for old doctors.

In other words: beware of though-mindedly accepting bad consequences of overall good policies. Look for a superior alternative first.

IAWYC. One quibble:

we could raise taxes slightly to finance government-mandated programs for...early retirement for old doctors.

If illness is abolished, what's the point of retirement?

30SilasBarta15y

I agree. Unfortunately, the way it actually works is, "No, we can't allow your universal cure -- the AMA/[your country's MD association] is upset." "No, we can't accept your free widgets -- that would cost our widgetmakers major sales." "No, I don't want you to work for me for free -- that would put domestic servants out of jobs." "No, I don't want to marry you -- that would hurt the income of local prostitutes." "No, I don't want your solar radiation -- that would put our light and heat industries out of business." Edit: Even better: "No, I don't want you to be my friend -- what about my therapist's loss of revenue?"

3endoself15y

That can be a danger, but I think starvation is an obvious enough problem that people won't take this literally.