[chickenfries]

In my mind, there are worse things to be in life than a loser, by Taleb's definition. Far worse to be someone who takes pleasure in exploiting the ignorance of his fellow man, in my book. This is the kind of view that sees someone like Trump as a winner in business, rather than someone who doesn't pay his bills, has an enormous amount of debt, and takes money that was supposed to go to St. Jude's from his son's charity organization.

> And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

I'm not christian, but I've always loved this quote. It's not about god punishing people for being rich, it's that being rich and worshipping money above all else makes it very, very hard to be a good person.

[VikingCoder]

The end of the quote is "fun and profit."

I think you jumped to economic profit for an individual.

But I think we should think of the good of the many. Hans Rosling talked about nations that are opt-in for organ donation, versus nations that are opt-out for organ donation. Turns out, people don't change the default. So, opt-out organ donation is MUCH BETTER for everyone.

That's an example of exploiting human behavior for the benefit of all.

Fun and Profit. =)

[chickenfries]

> I think you jumped to economic profit for an individual.

Do you actually think my reading is unreasonable?

Somehow I think Hans Rosling would use a different phrase than "for fun and profit." The phrase "for fun and profit" heavily connotes economic profit. Especially coming from Taleb, and especially on HN.

But sure, if I take the less common meaning of profit (a benefit) then yes there is nothing selfish about this quote.

Edit: Furthermore, this post is about worthless crypto currencies and exploiting the ignorant.

[VikingCoder]

Your read is 100% reasonable.

I just delight in cataloging those human failings, and being confronted with the message "SO EXPLOIT THEM, ALREADY!" resonates strongly with me.

Like, as a for instance, we spend more on the lottery than we do on tons of other stuff combined. [1]

And sure, that's neat, it helps pay for some things in states... But that's ridiculously harmful to those who can least afford it.

Well, how about if we figure out how to do some good?

On FB right now I'm kibitzing with some of my educator friends about trying to gamify education more. Original thought, right? :) But really, this is what we're doing. Exploiting human faults, and trying to do good with them. Humans like semi-varied reward schedules. So, exploit that, and teach them. What other human flaws can we exploit? =D

[1] http://money.cnn.com/2015/02/11/news/companies/lottery-spend...