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I actually have nothing against frivolous spending, since buying a yacht doesn't subtract from the high end talent pool. If you're going to put up a few mil to
by vladislav 8y ago
I actually have nothing against frivolous spending, since buying a yacht doesn't subtract from the high end talent pool. If you're going to put up a few mil to solve a math problem, why not something like P v. NP, or the Riemann hypothesis, or countless applied math problems. Instead it was spent on some kind of spectacle of arbitrary mental effort.
- thaumasiotes 8y agoCome on. There already is a $1 million bounty on P vs NP.
- quickthrower2 8y agoCrypto people don't want P=NP though.
- TFYS 8y agoBuying a yacht does subtract from a high end talent pool. It requires talented people to design and build a yacht.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- vladislav 8y agoHigh end is a very relative term. No doubt it requires talented people, but you don't see Feynman working on it.
- wastedhours 8y ago> since buying a yacht doesn't subtract from the high end talent pool What about all of those highly skilled technicians and engineers who dedicate years to building said yacht who aren't building rockets or faster trains for us all or designing better schools? Etc, etc... Any argument rooted in "these other people should do X instead of Y because I think X is more important and want to see them do it" fails from inherent selfishness. Whether X is indeed better than Y is moot.
- vladislav 8y ago"Whether X is indeed better than Y is moot." Actually it's probably one of the most worthwhile questions, philosophically and practically. If this question doesn't get properly considered, we end up with blind glorification of activities whose main selling point is revenue generation and shitty feedback loops in society over generations.
- wastedhours 8y ago> blind glorification of activities whose main selling point is revenue generation Not inherently. Only in the cases where it's a true choice between something revenue generating, and something people are doing for social good. Your perception of social good (people dedicating their time to intellectual puzzles you deem worthy vs people wasting their time on these meaningless displays of skill), is different to someone else's. My point was perhaps too broad - but deigning to tell someone their pursuit isn't as worthy as one you think they should be pursuing is, frankly, pointless.
- vladislav 8y ago"My point was perhaps too broad - but deigning to tell someone their pursuit isn't as worthy as one you think they should be pursuing is, frankly, pointless." That seems to assume immutable human values, and/or a postmodern view of the world. Promoting thoughtfulness about the meaning of human activity seems pretty valuable, regardless of the conclusion.
- wastedhours 8y agoThoughtfulness, yes, judgement, no. Perhaps it's the medium of this discussion, but the reason your comment was downvoted was because it came across as judgemental and dismissive. I've been CMO of a startup, and could spend my free time developing marketing plans for NGOs looking after sick kids to get them more donations, but I spend my talents and time watching arbitrary funny cat videos. I know it's not the highest order use of abilities, but assuming people should only pursue what you deem to be the most worthy, and dismissing other pursuits, is a thought process so academic it's almost pointless to real-world discourse.
- PhasmaFelis 8y agoShould I assume you're also opposed to, say, logic puzzles, or chess?