Narrow the thought experiment to “cancer that banks aren’t able to find out about” and the thought experiment goes through fine. And US institutions are strongly supportive of secrecy, in general, so I think this is actually the typical case (at least for people who are young enough that seeking a large loan is not itself suspicious).
Mortgage rates for older people are higher. And if mortgage holders die, the mortgage must still be paid by the executor of an estate, which is a disincentive for anyone with a bequest motive.
I’m sure that we can find some corner case where young cancer victims with no friends/family or no regard for their friends/family act otherwise. But this hardly seems important for the point that you—yes, you—can make money by implementing the trades suggested in this piece. Which is the claim that Yudkowsky is using the cancer victim analogy to argue against.
Pasting some of my replies to this from twitter FWIW:
That’s just not correct, unless I’m misunderstanding— if you short rates, and next day the market decides you are right, then real rates spike and you make money. Simple as that So I don’t follow your claim ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Sovereign debt markets are the some of the most well-functioning financial markets ever created by man—this is literal orders of magnitude off. This is just not tether
I think the claim is that with fast takeoff, the market will either never decide that you are right (we die before the market realizes), or will decide you are right and you get rich but have only a short time to live, so there’s no value to being rich.
Seems relevant (link) :
(agree/disagree with this comment to agree/disagree with the tweets below)
Edit: Yudkowsky commented on the post, consider replying to him directly
Huh? Terminal cancer victims taking out 30-year mortgages is extremely different, in terms of the counter-party’s willingness to trade.
Narrow the thought experiment to “cancer that banks aren’t able to find out about” and the thought experiment goes through fine. And US institutions are strongly supportive of secrecy, in general, so I think this is actually the typical case (at least for people who are young enough that seeking a large loan is not itself suspicious).
That does not get the thought experiment through.
Mortgage rates for older people are higher. And if mortgage holders die, the mortgage must still be paid by the executor of an estate, which is a disincentive for anyone with a bequest motive.
I’m sure that we can find some corner case where young cancer victims with no friends/family or no regard for their friends/family act otherwise. But this hardly seems important for the point that you—yes, you—can make money by implementing the trades suggested in this piece. Which is the claim that Yudkowsky is using the cancer victim analogy to argue against.
Pasting some of my replies to this from twitter FWIW:
That’s just not correct, unless I’m misunderstanding—
if you short rates, and next day the market decides you are right, then real rates spike and you make money. Simple as that
So I don’t follow your claim ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Sovereign debt markets are the some of the most well-functioning financial markets ever created by man—this is literal orders of magnitude off. This is just not tether
also
I think the claim is that with fast takeoff, the market will either never decide that you are right (we die before the market realizes), or will decide you are right and you get rich but have only a short time to live, so there’s no value to being rich.