It isn’t. Wikipedia tells me that 100,000 people die of aging every day after decades of suffering. So unless each of that 800,000 - remembering that aging deaths are only going to go up and mattnewport’s articles on that 800k being inflated, and that the rapes and tortures are not the average, but extremes, much like Uncle Tom was not the usual experience of Southern US slaves—suffers 45x more than each aging victim, aging is a much bigger problem than human trafficking.
Yes, it is a much bigger problem, and I already admitted that, and I champion that cause myself. I still think human trafficking fits somewhere above ‘very few’, and that for problems on the scope of aging there do not exist adjectives capable of expressing that weight of suffering. I’m also incapable of caring about one thing to the exclusion of all others.
To summarize: Defining “not very much” as “less than 100,000 per day” makes it a useless phrase.
I don’t think it’s useless. We should only care about the largest problems, especially when there’s orders of magnitude between the largest problems and suggested-other-problems-we-should-care-about.
To steal an example from Eliezer: to divvy up your resources and mental effort among multiple causes, some of which are very small, is like seeing a spinning wheel which is 20% red and 80% blue, and thinking, ‘I’ll make the most money by betting 20% of the time on red and 80% of the time on blue!’ Actually, one should just bet 100% of the time on blue, and win 80% of the time; the other strategy would win <80%.
To put it another way, what on earth makes you think the marginal value of your dollar or interest helps human trafficking more than aging?
Human trafficking is a durable institution driven by powerful interests and countless intersecting conditions of life, and arguably will persist as long as economic disparity means there are people who wish to move from ‘poor’ countries to ‘rich’ countries. Working against that is about as likely to help as the trillions poured down the drain of Africa.
Aging, on the other hand, is ‘just’ an engineering problem, which nothing prevents researchers from directly tackling, and it’s not a vicious cycle of interests and desires, but a virtuous one—if you can help the first credible breakthrough be made, the free market may well do the rest (because everyone needs a cure for aging, it’s the largest possible market).
This sort of post is why I get so pissed off at this place, made all the worse because I’ve already agreed, twice, that aging is more important on a scale that there exist no adjectives to even describe, and that I consider this argument pointlessand that I’ve already changed my categorization (right over there, maybe you should read the rest of the thread?).
I’ve also made similar scale arguments in support of other initiatives (on this very article!), and I back them up with action. What the fuck more do you want from me? That I stop caring about humans? That I quit my job and start trafficking slaves to force them to work in our anti-aging mines?
and that I consider this argument pointless and that I’ve already changed my categorization (right over there, maybe you should read the rest of the thread?).
I apologize for not re-reading the other threads on each reply; when I get the red box, I tend to read just that.
That I quit my job and start trafficking slaves to force them to work in our anti-aging mines?
Yes. The spice must flow!
You are one heartless son of a bitch.
I keep it in inside a needle, which is in an egg, which is in a duck, which is in a hare, which is in an iron chest, which is buried under a green oak tree, which is on the island of Buyan, in the ocean. As long as my heart is safe, I shall never die.
It isn’t. Wikipedia tells me that 100,000 people die of aging every day after decades of suffering. So unless each of that 800,000 - remembering that aging deaths are only going to go up and mattnewport’s articles on that 800k being inflated, and that the rapes and tortures are not the average, but extremes, much like Uncle Tom was not the usual experience of Southern US slaves—suffers 45x more than each aging victim, aging is a much bigger problem than human trafficking.
Yes, it is a much bigger problem, and I already admitted that, and I champion that cause myself. I still think human trafficking fits somewhere above ‘very few’, and that for problems on the scope of aging there do not exist adjectives capable of expressing that weight of suffering. I’m also incapable of caring about one thing to the exclusion of all others.
To summarize: Defining “not very much” as “less than 100,000 per day” makes it a useless phrase.
I don’t think it’s useless. We should only care about the largest problems, especially when there’s orders of magnitude between the largest problems and suggested-other-problems-we-should-care-about.
To steal an example from Eliezer: to divvy up your resources and mental effort among multiple causes, some of which are very small, is like seeing a spinning wheel which is 20% red and 80% blue, and thinking, ‘I’ll make the most money by betting 20% of the time on red and 80% of the time on blue!’ Actually, one should just bet 100% of the time on blue, and win 80% of the time; the other strategy would win <80%.
To put it another way, what on earth makes you think the marginal value of your dollar or interest helps human trafficking more than aging?
Human trafficking is a durable institution driven by powerful interests and countless intersecting conditions of life, and arguably will persist as long as economic disparity means there are people who wish to move from ‘poor’ countries to ‘rich’ countries. Working against that is about as likely to help as the trillions poured down the drain of Africa.
Aging, on the other hand, is ‘just’ an engineering problem, which nothing prevents researchers from directly tackling, and it’s not a vicious cycle of interests and desires, but a virtuous one—if you can help the first credible breakthrough be made, the free market may well do the rest (because everyone needs a cure for aging, it’s the largest possible market).
This sort of post is why I get so pissed off at this place, made all the worse because I’ve already agreed, twice, that aging is more important on a scale that there exist no adjectives to even describe, and that I consider this argument pointless and that I’ve already changed my categorization (right over there, maybe you should read the rest of the thread?).
I’ve also made similar scale arguments in support of other initiatives (on this very article!), and I back them up with action. What the fuck more do you want from me? That I stop caring about humans? That I quit my job and start trafficking slaves to force them to work in our anti-aging mines?
You are one heartless son of a bitch.
I apologize for not re-reading the other threads on each reply; when I get the red box, I tend to read just that.
Yes. The spice must flow!
I keep it in inside a needle, which is in an egg, which is in a duck, which is in a hare, which is in an iron chest, which is buried under a green oak tree, which is on the island of Buyan, in the ocean. As long as my heart is safe, I shall never die.
Troll.