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Viliam comments on Open thread, Jul. 11 - Jul. 17, 2016 - Less Wrong Discussion

4 Post author: MrMind 11 July 2016 07:09AM

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Comment author: Viliam 13 July 2016 07:58:13AM *  0 points [-]

why not keep track of how much food my guests actually ate, and try adjusting the amount of food at my next party to match?

I guess there is not a fixed amount of food brought per guest, but rather a random distribution. The host's goal is not to make sure that the average "food brought" equals the average "food desired", but rather that with, say, 95% probability the current "food brought" is at least 90% of "food desired" (feel free to change the numbers to fit your experience). Also, the host is hedging against the possibility that the few guests who usually come with hands full of food, suddenly can't come or for some random reason come empty-handed.

There are charities that focus on "recycling" food waste

I guess the best way to improve the world is to have a list of such charities in your neighborhood ready in a printed form, and give it to the host if they are interested.

Comment author: gjm 13 July 2016 09:56:16AM -2 points [-]

I agree with all that and would add:

  • "Too much food" is a much less fun-killing failure mode than "Not enough food".
  • You'd like guests to have a decent choice of things to eat even at the start when not so much has been brought and at the end when lots has been eaten. In particular, plenty of choice at the end of the party => lots of food left over.
  • At least some party food keeps well and serves nicely as snack food, so if you have too much you just eat it later. (Or maybe bring it to another party. Check those best-before dates!)
  • Having too much food kinda suggests "this person has lots of generous friends and/or limitless resources" whereas having too little kinda suggests "this person has no generous friends and is in financial trouble". Which message would you rather be sending to your party guests?
  • The wastage isn't super-expensive anyway. What fraction of your income do you spend on party food?
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