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ygert comments on Voting is like donating thousands of dollars to charity - Less Wrong
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Hmm... The calculations work, but somehow it seems against our intuitions. Thinking about it, it seems that the problem is one of scope insensitivity. $100 billion, $700 billion, $7 trillion. They all feel more or less the same, which of course, is absolutely insane. When I look at the numbers, it just feels like "a lot". Ultimately, what this post is saying is to simply shut up and multiply, which is a very good and and very relevant point.
Think of "billion" as being just the name of a unit, like an inch, or a light-year. You have 100, 700, or 7000 units. Do they still feel the same?
Yeah, of course, I understand about the problem of scope insensitivity and how to try to avoid it. My point was that before reading this article, I did not think of it like that, but rather just looked at that number and thought "a lot". Reading this article made me understand that I was being scope insensitive, and that let me put everything into perspective, in a similar manner to the method you stated. The big problem with biases like this isn't compensating for them once you identify them, but rather identifying them in the first place.