"It very well may be that society is optimizing an objective function quite different from the one that you claim it should." What is it optimizing for? Should

"It very well may be that society is optimizing an objective function quite different from the one that you claim it should." What is it optimizing for? Shouldn't it be intentional, and therefore apparent? If we're willing to throw so much money at saving so few lives, I don't see how it can ever make sense to allow lives to be lost that could be saved more cheaply. Sure, defending against terrorism helps to prevent property losses as well, but I still don't think we come out on top.