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I wonder what evolutionary pressures caused humans to have these qualities? Surely the dopamine response in a crude way - but can we link the actual 'gambling-l

I wonder what evolutionary pressures caused humans to have these qualities? Surely the dopamine response in a crude way - but can we link the actual 'gambling-like' elements to human behaviours that might have been beneficial? 'Fear' keeps us away from Bears and cliffs ... but risk and gambling? Tricky one.

toasterlovin 10y ago
In most forms of organized gambling, the odds are against you, so the behavior only has negative outcomes. In real life, this is not always the case. Lots of the most successful people you're aware of (CEOs, VCs, actors, musicians, politicians, etc) probably took a series of pretty insane risks at some point in their life. If they had not, they would just be normal people. But they did, and they got a huge payoff. That's why risk taking is wired into many of us.
- ssharp 10y ago
  > In most forms of organized gambling, the odds are against you, so the behavior only has negative outcomes. I think lottery jackpot winners would disagree with that. You're only guaranteed a negative outcome in these types of games when you've iterated enough times to reach a statistical conclusion. In the meantime, short-term luck in the game's variance could earn you a lot of money or lose you far more than you'd expect. If the expected value of $1 bet in blackjack is $0.99, the return of a single hand will never be that; it would be -$1, $0, $1, $1.50, etc.
rz2k 10y ago
I think that's an interesting question. On a site devoted to entrepreneurship, taking risks sounds pretty good. And, due to survivorship bias even poorly calculated risks will sound good. Perhaps there's a real world bias as well. Historically, humans had many more children than would live long enough to bear children. Those who played it safe wouldn't thrive enough to have a lot of children. Those who did take a lot of risks either got erased from the record, or went on to have a lot of children. Genghis Khan is probably the best example! Furthering the idea, bears and cliffs are risky, but a sensible human would have been even more afraid of other humans. And yet, the most cosmopolitan societies tend to be the most successful in terms of demographic health measures as well as economic, political, and even military strength. Just as it's said that mobsters may be some of the most cautious investors of their accumulated wealth, places where people or more risky in terms of not "othering" as many people get a lot of benefits from the ready trust they place in their neighbors.
ChoHag 10y ago
Practice. Practice in dealing with day-to-day risk. Pretty much everything we do that doesn't directly contribute to our survival is practice for the things that do. We also call this play or, in cats, mindless torture of cute furry animals. In humans modern life comes with problems our biology was not designed to deal with and it fucks us up.

toasterlovin 10y ago

In most forms of organized gambling, the odds are against you, so the behavior only has negative outcomes. In real life, this is not always the case. Lots of the most successful people you're aware of (CEOs, VCs, actors, musicians, politicians, etc) probably took a series of pretty insane risks at some point in their life. If they had not, they would just be normal people. But they did, and they got a huge payoff. That's why risk taking is wired into many of us.

ssharp 10y ago
> In most forms of organized gambling, the odds are against you, so the behavior only has negative outcomes. I think lottery jackpot winners would disagree with that. You're only guaranteed a negative outcome in these types of games when you've iterated enough times to reach a statistical conclusion. In the meantime, short-term luck in the game's variance could earn you a lot of money or lose you far more than you'd expect. If the expected value of $1 bet in blackjack is $0.99, the return of a single hand will never be that; it would be -$1, $0, $1, $1.50, etc.

rz2k 10y ago

I think that's an interesting question. On a site devoted to entrepreneurship, taking risks sounds pretty good. And, due to survivorship bias even poorly calculated risks will sound good. Perhaps there's a real world bias as well. Historically, humans had many more children than would live long enough to bear children. Those who played it safe wouldn't thrive enough to have a lot of children. Those who did take a lot of risks either got erased from the record, or went on to have a lot of children. Genghis Khan is probably the best example! Furthering the idea, bears and cliffs are risky, but a sensible human would have been even more afraid of other humans. And yet, the most cosmopolitan societies tend to be the most successful in terms of demographic health measures as well as economic, political, and even military strength. Just as it's said that mobsters may be some of the most cautious investors of their accumulated wealth, places where people or more risky in terms of not "othering" as many people get a lot of benefits from the ready trust they place in their neighbors.

ChoHag 10y ago

Practice. Practice in dealing with day-to-day risk. Pretty much everything we do that doesn't directly contribute to our survival is practice for the things that do. We also call this play or, in cats, mindless torture of cute furry animals. In humans modern life comes with problems our biology was not designed to deal with and it fucks us up.