Hear me out: Whenever people try the "math argument" on a gambler they are basically wrong and are misunderstanding how recreational gamblers actually think, which is not irrational (for the most part) or at least not irrational in the way people think on the surface.
Take the lottery: The classic "math objection" is to explain to the person that the expectation[1] of buying tickets in a lottery is negative so over time they will (on average) lose money.
Most people who gamble know this. The thing is they are not trying to maximise expectation. They are trying to maximise "expected marginal utility"[2]. They know that the dollar they spend on the ticket affects their life far less than the payoff would in the unlikely event they get it. Because the marginal utility of -$1 is basically nothing (it wouldn't change their life much at all to lose a dollar) versus winning say $10mil would completely change the life of most people and therefore the marginal utility of +10mil is much more than 10mil times greater than the marginal utility lost by spending a dollar on the ticket.
It is fundamentally this difference that the gambling companies are arbitraging. And for people who become addicted to gambling it is like any other addiction. The companies are just exploiting people who have a disease and are ruining their lives for profit. There are studies which show that addicted gamblers don't actually get the dopamine hit from winning, they get it from anticipating the win (ie the spin). So actually winning or losing just keeps them wanting to come back for another hit.
[1] Ie the average payoff weighted by probability
[2] Ie the average difference in utility weighted by probability. This could be seen as how much of a difference the payoff would make to their life.
This has happened in online chess, with some people admitting to using engines (ie cheating) to "confirm their suspicion that the other guy is cheating".
Remember you're living in a world where people idolize Elon Musk, a person who employed someone to play path of exile and diabolo to boost his account (ie a cheater). Also a lot of people don't care (or claim not to care) whether people see them as losers as long as they wreck other folks day.
I don't know a single person who doesn't think that the PoE thing was super cringe. To the extent that people idolize Elon, it's because they think his accomplishments outweigh him making a massive fool of himself in that instance.
Yes. It’s not legal to coach a witness in that way and in particular in real time. Apparently the dude was Lithuanian but was bringing an action in the UK. This is relevant because he had a Lithuanian lawyer attending via video link who claimed not to be acting for him. The judge thought that was fishy and terminated the video link. The guy started playing for time instead of answering questions and they noticed the smart glasses. When they removed his glasses his mobile phone in his pocket came on speakerphone with the voice of someone reading out the answers he should give.
Bottom line: all his evidence was deemed untrustworthy and thrown out and the judge found for the defendant in the entirety.
It's fair to say that after all the descriptions of the shire vs isengard etc in the LoTR, his position on mechanization and cars isn't very surprising, but it's quite extraordinary for this to show up.
The balance at least on this site is strongly in favour of humans writing things.
You’re belabouring the point because you don’t believe that by filling the internet with slop you’re doing anything wrong when actually it’s antisocial and wrecks the commons.
If you think content matters so much then just invest the time in writing it yourself rather than trying to convince others that it is ok that you didn’t.
Sigh. I did write it, then I used an LLM to clean it up. Seriously, if you can find anything else out there making a similar point or providing a similar library I'd love to hear about it.
The Lords doesn’t actually have the power to veto bills thanks to the Parliament act. They also have a principle of ultimate legislative priority under which they defer to the commons in matters where the commons puts its foot down. They generally act as a revising body rather than outright attempting to defy the commons.
> Under the Parliament Acts 1911 and 1949 it is possible for a bill to be presented for Royal Assent without the agreement of the House of Lords, provided that certain conditions are met. This change was seen by some as a departure from Dicey’s notion of sovereignty conferred upon a tripartite body.
On the other hand, the process of having Commons legislation rejected by the Lords, then amended and sent back can take almost a year. A government looking to push its legislative programme in a single parliament may choose to remove the most controversial elements in return for an easier passage through the Lords. In this way, just the threat of Lords scrutiny can be enough to moderate the output of the Commons.
Take the lottery: The classic "math objection" is to explain to the person that the expectation[1] of buying tickets in a lottery is negative so over time they will (on average) lose money.
Most people who gamble know this. The thing is they are not trying to maximise expectation. They are trying to maximise "expected marginal utility"[2]. They know that the dollar they spend on the ticket affects their life far less than the payoff would in the unlikely event they get it. Because the marginal utility of -$1 is basically nothing (it wouldn't change their life much at all to lose a dollar) versus winning say $10mil would completely change the life of most people and therefore the marginal utility of +10mil is much more than 10mil times greater than the marginal utility lost by spending a dollar on the ticket.
It is fundamentally this difference that the gambling companies are arbitraging. And for people who become addicted to gambling it is like any other addiction. The companies are just exploiting people who have a disease and are ruining their lives for profit. There are studies which show that addicted gamblers don't actually get the dopamine hit from winning, they get it from anticipating the win (ie the spin). So actually winning or losing just keeps them wanting to come back for another hit.
[1] Ie the average payoff weighted by probability
[2] Ie the average difference in utility weighted by probability. This could be seen as how much of a difference the payoff would make to their life.
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