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vbuterin comments on Bitcoin value and small probability / high impact arguments - Less Wrong Discussion

4 Post author: vbuterin 31 March 2015 04:48PM

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Comment author: vbuterin 31 March 2015 06:59:39PM 0 points [-]

Right, I agree, my 5% * $34000 is only slightly Pascalian. I'm only using the Pascal reference because it is the best representative example I know of the general class of such scenarios (note that other "Pascalian" scenarios of this type are fairly common in the investment world; every startup crank loves throwing out the whole "if you think there's only a 0.1% chance I'm right, you'll get an EV of $100b * 0.001 = $100m" line). If you know of a better name for the category, please share. I also used the Drake Equation as an analogy elsewhere in that r/buttcoin thread; perhaps that might be a better fit.

Comment author: Ander 31 March 2015 07:07:40PM 0 points [-]

I'm not sure what a better term would be. Maybe 'lottery tickets', but that is still too low probability/high reward for what we are talking about.