[rumanator]

> So someone with 1 day left in their life is equal to someone with 70 years?

You're the one trying to quantify the value of life.

To me, my parents and grandparents are more important than your 1yo son/daughter, so YMMV.

Still, you're missing the whole point. The point is that it makes absolutely no sense to downplay an epidemic just because it hits hardest on those suffering from pre-existing medical conditions or being over 40. The coffins piling up on makeshift morgues make it quite obvious that the real effect of the death wave is not anticipating death by a couple of hours, and it matters nothing if those doing the dying are sick, old, or disabled.

[mewpmewp2]

So are you saying it's entirely binary? It's either terrible and should be avoided at all costs, or it's no-one dying?

You are bringing out facts such as "coffins are piling up" etc, this fact could be true if in one morgue in two places in the world there were coffins piling up. Maybe these morgues can only handle 5 deaths at once and now there's 5 more for each?

You need to quantify things to understand how bad they are. Otherwise these statements are meaningless.

You are essentially quantifying - any statement you do you is actually quantifying. For instance if you bring out the argument about coffins piling you seem to be considering potentially 10 deaths (which could cause coffins piling) to be the same as the whole world population dying.

[rumanator]

> So are you saying it's entirely binary?

I'm stating the exact opposite: that crudely abusing statistics to pretend that people over 40 don't count for nothing because they will die in a few years is abhorrent, and downplays the real impact of the whole covid death wave.

[randomsearch]

Wow, you’d sacrifice a 1yo to save your grandparents? I find that genuinely shocking.

[simiones]

That is not what was being said - they said that they personally value the lives of their own parents more than the life of someone else's child; this in the context of someone trying to argue that the life of a 1 year old is inherently more valuable than the life of a 60 year old because the 1 year old can expect 79 more years of life, while the 60 year old can only expect 20 more.

And otherwise, assume there is a fire and you are in the middle of a corridor. On one end there is your mother, on the other there is some 1 year old you don't know in any way. Which would you rush to save first? I know I would rush to save my mother before the 1 year old.

[mewpmewp2]

So the implication is that we should calculate the emotional pain value instead of expected years left and act based on that? So if for example the 1 year old in question has no parents because they died due to an accident and no other relatives it means no-one will really mourn this death so we would choose this death over a popular 80 year old person?

[rumanator]

> So the implication is that we should calculate the emotional pain

Wrong, the implications is that it makes absolutely no sense to state that society should just let old people die simply because you're so self-centered that you even fail to register the devastating effect of an epidemic just because you believe it doesn't affect you personally.

[colde]

I think the argument is more akin to not sacrificing anybody, and trying to save everyone.

[mewpmewp2]

But in real world that is not possible. There's somewhere a line you have to draw. How many man-hours would you be willing to spend to save someone who would die in a week anyway?

According to that logic you should have all 7+ billion people working that whole week to keep this person alive.

Would the man-hours spent saving that person have to be exactly the same as saving someone who has further life expectancy of 70 years?

[Gibbon1]

That's not really the choice here. The choice is we squelch the virus and my dad and his grand children get to see each other again. Vs you not being inconvenienced.

[mewpmewp2]

I couldn't reply for the other comment, maybe because it's too nested, but I'm replying to:

> You're pretending that the economic dislocations are do to measures to combate the virus instead of the virus killing people. Countries that acted swiftly and forcefully are returning to normal right now. While countries that are handling the way you want are seeing no end to this. Meaning you are 180 degrees wrong, your way kills people from the virus. You way kills people via extended economic dislocation.

1. I haven't made a choice on what is the best option.

2. There's no "my way", all I'm saying that these aspects should be considered and math should be ran and it is possible that another option could be better, a combination of some options etc. And in order to determine what is the best way should be using calculations.

3. It should also be discussed how to do these calculations. Should we consider death as a binary or should we consider "time left", "quality time left". How do we calculate loss of life, time, resources that stems from people unable to be productive etc, because certainly there are consequences to that.

4. I'm trying to prove that this should not be binary and there should be a line drawn somewhere considering all the pros and cons from the both sides, assigning weights to those and trying to predict what is best option from that.

These discussions should still be held even if it's not about coronavirus, but other similar decisions as well.

[mewpmewp2]

Since you are trying to make things personal... I'm personally not inconvenienced, I love WFH and having a good reason not to meet people.

So once again is that choice also appropriate if 7+ bln people have to spend 3 months working in order to save your dad? Obviously a lot of other people die because if they have to work 3 months saving your father it means the doctors are not saving other people, we won't have food etc.

I'm trying to show that there must be a line drawn somewhere and it can't be binary.

[Gibbon1]

You're pretending that the economic dislocations are do to measures to combate the virus instead of the virus killing people. Countries that acted swiftly and forcefully are returning to normal right now. While countries that are handling the way you want are seeing no end to this. Meaning you are 180 degrees wrong, your way kills people from the virus. You way kills people via extended economic dislocation.