The article's main thrust is a focus on risks that have negligible gain. So in that context your argument reads, "they have more to gain from a risk that has negligible gain."
Negligible gain can still be enough to distinguish oneself. What gain do colourful feathers on birds really have except to draw attention.
Also, evolution is likely not precise enough to have evolved accurate intuitions about the fitness value of all possible risks. We should expect some reasonably broad degree of randomness around the value of risk taking.
I disagree. It's a self-contradictory point. I was being charitable to call it "negligible" considering the article also refers to the gain as "non-existent."
>"What gain do colourful feathers on birds really have except to draw attention"
When drawing attention gives you a disproportionate advantage to attracting a mate vs. attracting a predator, it's a very important (and non-neglible) gain.
>We should expect some reasonably broad degree of randomness around the value of risk taking.
I don't think this negates the point. Just because the there is a distribution in the value doesn't mean there isn't a statistically significant directionality of that distribution. I can say there's a distribution of individual player height in the NBA, but that doesn't mean we can't draw conclusions about height having generalized value at the population level regarding the chances of making it to professional basketball.
> When drawing attention gives you a disproportionate advantage to attracting a mate vs. attracting a predator, it's a very important (and non-neglible) gain.
Humans have no natural predators, so one side of the equation is zero, and the other non-zero.
> Just because the there is a distribution in the value doesn't mean there isn't a statistically significant directionality of that distribution.
Yes, and there is directionality in risk-taking as well. Discoveries, fortunes and high-value mates all require risk taking.
Even risks that appear to have negligible or even zero fitness value, like extreme sports, have netted many people valuable sponsorships or YouTube fame and fortune.
Evolution is not precise and simply cannot capture the full nuance of a concept like "status" in human culture, therefore it has permitted a broad distribution of risk taking.
>Even risks that appear to have negligible or even zero fitness value, like extreme sports, have netted many people valuable sponsorships or YouTube fame and fortune.
You do realize you contradict yourself here, right?
You’ve essentially said “This activity that amasses stays and resources has negligible fitness value.”
That only makes sense if you think status and resources don’t impact fitness/survivability. You might be confusing inherent value with signaling value. Driving a Ferrari doesn’t give me any additional inherent fitness. But it does serve as a potential signal for status, which can confer added fitness in practice. Signals can be wrong, of course, while still giving an advantage.
> You do realize you contradict yourself here, right?
I'm pointing out your contradiction, because extreme sports are exactly the same kind of behaviour which is the subject of this article, and that you classified as negligible or zero value before it exploded in popularity.
The point being that a wide latitude of risk seeking behaviour allows people to find new and unexpected success modes, even if they at first appear to convey little benefit and incur considerable risk.
So your point is that the v types of behavior displayed by Darwin Awards have the potential to be widely remunerated by society one day? So, things like pointing a gun at your head and pulling the trigger to prove that it’s loaded? I guess I’m not quite as cynical about society and classify those as not just differences in degree, but also differences in type.
Also, evolution is likely not precise enough to have evolved accurate intuitions about the fitness value of all possible risks. We should expect some reasonably broad degree of randomness around the value of risk taking.