For my own part, I appreciate that the Red Cross (and etc.) is trying to satisfy multiple constraints, only one of which is the actual safety of their blood supply, and I don’t object to that. But the constraints that apply to them in articulating a policy don’t necessarily apply to me in donating blood.
On the other hand you have constraints that they do not have, not least of which is the lack of scaling benefits for your research and decision making efforts.
We are left with an optimal approach of considering what we know of our own blood that the collection agency does not (or is forbidden from discriminating on). We can approximate whether this knowledge would make the blood more suitable or less. Only if ‘less’ do we need worry about how significant that extra knowledge is.
I don’t do it, mostly because I’m so irritated by the policy that I’ve worked my way into a completely counterproductive “F—k it, then, donate your own f—king blood, see if I care” kind of sulk about it. I’m not proud of this, but there it is.
Yes, I condone it… indeed, I endorse it… in situations very much like mine.
For my own part, I appreciate that the Red Cross (and etc.) is trying to satisfy multiple constraints, only one of which is the actual safety of their blood supply, and I don’t object to that. But the constraints that apply to them in articulating a policy don’t necessarily apply to me in donating blood.
On the other hand you have constraints that they do not have, not least of which is the lack of scaling benefits for your research and decision making efforts.
We are left with an optimal approach of considering what we know of our own blood that the collection agency does not (or is forbidden from discriminating on). We can approximate whether this knowledge would make the blood more suitable or less. Only if ‘less’ do we need worry about how significant that extra knowledge is.
We also need to worry if the answer is ‘more’ and because of that we decide to lie on the answer form so that we can donate.
I kind of get the impression that TheOtherDave is doing that, or at least would condone it under circumstances very much like his.
I don’t do it, mostly because I’m so irritated by the policy that I’ve worked my way into a completely counterproductive “F—k it, then, donate your own f—king blood, see if I care” kind of sulk about it. I’m not proud of this, but there it is.
Yes, I condone it… indeed, I endorse it… in situations very much like mine.