Time scales matter a lot. As opposed to all the genres the HPatMoR characters think they’re in, I think I’m living in a 4-X game like Civilization or Master of Orion. You don’t work directly on the Science Victory Condition (in this case, FAI) if you can do better growing your research and production capacities to build the FAI faster, but you also don’t waste your time building up capacity when it’s time to race for the finish line. A median of 2030 is, in my very rough and not at all accurate estimate, annoying close to the border line, although mine is more along the lines of 2050.
There’s a great section in “The Black Swan” where Taleb is called in to consult for a casino or something, and he discovers that the biggest losses the casino ever suffered weren’t due to bad luck in the blackjack pits or anything like that. One loss involved a lawsuit caused by a stage tiger that got loose and hurt a bunch of people; another loss was caused when an employee failed, for inexplicable reasons, to send a special tax form to the IRS, so the casino was hit with a big penalty.
Time scales matter a lot. As opposed to all the genres the HPatMoR characters think they’re in, I think I’m living in a 4-X game like Civilization or Master of Orion. You don’t work directly on the Science Victory Condition (in this case, FAI) if you can do better growing your research and production capacities to build the FAI faster, but you also don’t waste your time building up capacity when it’s time to race for the finish line. A median of 2030 is, in my very rough and not at all accurate estimate, annoying close to the border line, although mine is more along the lines of 2050.
Beware the Ludic Fallacy.
There’s a great section in “The Black Swan” where Taleb is called in to consult for a casino or something, and he discovers that the biggest losses the casino ever suffered weren’t due to bad luck in the blackjack pits or anything like that. One loss involved a lawsuit caused by a stage tiger that got loose and hurt a bunch of people; another loss was caused when an employee failed, for inexplicable reasons, to send a special tax form to the IRS, so the casino was hit with a big penalty.