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Robin Hanson's avatar

Curt, not wishing you hadn't tried does not show effort was not wasted, nor that there wasn't effort in hope of winning.

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Overcoming Bias Commenter's avatar

Robin, I don't think "actors, musicians, and athletes" make your point. It's rare for even the failures to wish they hadn't tried, so they view the pleasure of the activity and the competition as worth the costs even without the highly elevated status. Plus so many eagerly participate in those activities even with full knowledge they'll never be anything special. I think only concious seeking for status, beyond that engendered by normal urges, would count as "wasteful" from the seeking human's perspective. That's fairly rare, IMO restricted to specialty fields like politics and science.

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