When I first got into prediction markets twenty five years ago, I called them “idea futures”, and I focused on using them to reform how we deal with controversies in science and academia (see here, here
If you take bets on what the consensus answer to some question will be at a specific time in the future, you encourage researchers to keep their data and results secret, and to publish false results.
Maybe trying to fix everything about science at once isn't the way to go.
We do have initiatives such as the [reproducibility-initiative](http://validation.scienceex.... Setting up a prediction market on the outcomes of those replication attempts should be relatively straightforward and not require much resources.
But understand, the reliance on personal expertise is part of what's at issue. The reasoning behind prediction markets puts substantially greater emphasis on the ad hominem aspect of intellectual influence: more so than do I or mainstream intellectual history.
foragers were not communists, they were just small communes with few possessions that could be hoarded and no viable institutions to make hoarding possible.
They were militantly egalitarian, ganging up on any would be strong man.
You suggest there could be no domination because of the impracticability of hoarding. But domination was indeed possible as it had been the rule for our ape ancestors: domination was militantly resisted.
If Robin is a biased promoter then he is motivated by standard academic motives- pushing his idea- not by owning futures on some idea.
For info on how promotion works in financial markets, I look to financial markets. You look to a single academic who isn't even participating in a financial market.
"Personally, I think Robin cares far too much about being right. It isn't by virtue of being right that most contributions are made to intellectual life, which is a process of conversation."
Science is conversation constrained by certain ideas that tend to lead to greater accuracy. Norms have improved over time as science has adopted institutions that constrain BS and promote clarity. PM's are the next step.
Anyway, Stephen, you keep talking about how promotion affects financial markets, but your version of it is that held by the man on the street with no personal experience in them.
Foragers were not communists, they were just small communes with few possessions that could be hoarded and no viable institutions to make hoarding possible. They were for sure more socialist inclined than your average farmer but they never ahd to make the choice between capitalism and communism or something else.
Stopping population growth will lead to a higher GDP/capita but that will just make us more spoiled so we forget how scarcity has declined compared to the past: our ambitions will just grow with the level of wealth we have. Even if we have on average 5 Earth-like planets per person we'll still be inclined to think (and probably with good incentive reasons) that lazy people should have only 1 or 2 such planets and more productive members of society should perhaps get 10 (so yes, I do think we will eventually want to reduce inequality but we'll never want to eliminate it fully).
Seems to me overcoming scarcity requires only drastic limitation of population growth in the future. (This is what Robin says is impossible--even without ems.)
Overcoming scarcity doesn't mean unlimited abundance--only so much that egoistic striving can't comfortably be subordinated to social good. The Paleolithic foragers who had communism didn't overcome physics. It seems foraging lost to farming only when harsh scarcity began to prevail in the Mesolithic.
"Overcoming scarcity" would require breaking the laws of physics.
The not-so-distant future can be much more "socialist" than the present (basic income, education for all, that sort of thing) but it won't be communist, though of course new psychologies become a possibility in the far future and then communism could take over.
Communism doesn't "feel right"? When humankind has spent 90% of its time under a form of communism?
In a sense that's right; in Hansonian terms, farmer values come to prevail under scarcity. (Marx--and not even the Bolsheviks--envisioned communism succeeding in an isolated, backward country.)
It seems almost transparent that, if humanity ever overcomes scarcity, we'll be communist. (A cynical view of em theorizing might be that it's designed to demonstrate that scarcity will always be with us, that Malthus is eternal.)
And how would the existence of prediction markets dissuade sharing of bits of info at the margin?
I'm not (mainly) talking about sharing bits of information; rather, the sharing of understandings, theories, and counter-arguments. My claim is that widespread use of prediction markets (futarchy) would create a intelligentsia of promoters and hoarders.
The best way for us to understand an intellectual landscape dominated by prediction markets isn't to look at speculative markets generally (which only in the most indirect way address intellectual questions--for example, what is the main cause of inflation, not what will the inflation rate be in the next decade) but to look at how the orientation fostered by prediction markets affects the discourse of its advocates!
We have in Robin a great example of an intellectual shaped by the prediction-market mentality: ask how the quality of Robin's advocacy of prediction markets themselves has been affected by his devotion to them. Robin's uniqueness makes him interesting and socially useful, but do we want to see an intelligentsia composed of Robins?
What distinctive characteristics of Robin's discourse can be plausibly attributed to prediction markets (or, perhaps, to his already having had a mentality congruent with them)? I venture the following:
1. Robin never discusses the drawbacks of prediction markets. (Thus, followers like you end up denying there are any drawbacks--recent post.) While intellectuals are generally biased for their own views, intellectual status motivates most people to cultivate a degree open-mindedness. The prediction-market mentality seems to allow those who embrace it to justify being open promoters of their ideas.
2. Robin rarely (if ever) sets out the theoretical bases for his conclusions. I'd argue that doing so wouldn't serve promotional purposes; it would instead equip others to critique his conclusions.
3. Robin completely avoids issues related to his conclusions when they don't relate to promotion. Thus, he simply deigns not to comment on macro-economics.
You (with Moldbug) say leftism is advocacy of a scholarly dictatorship. I disagree: this is often the goal of Monomaniacalists, not (Utopianist) socialists/communists. ( http://tinyurl.com/6pt9eq5 ) [An extreme version is the Monomaniacalist dream of takeover by a "friendly AI."] But futarchy (or the widepread use of intellectual prediction markets) would turn scholars into traders.
Robin sees that folks don't really care about being correct, and he seeks to supply financial incentives. I think he fails to recognize that intellectual progress depends on the prevalance of the right intellectual norms much more than on the right individual incentives to be right. Personally, I think Robin cares far too much about being right. It isn't by virtue of being right that most contributions are made to intellectual life, which is a process of conversation.
Of course, in some sense, hedge funds transfer knowledge every time they trade based upon it, since their trades move the market price. So even if the public doesn't "learn" the information gathered in private, the public can perhaps infer such information.
The mere existence of prediction markets doesn't dissuade sharing information at the margin, of course. I'm not suggesting that prediction markets for science shouldn't exist (obviously they should; prediction markets should be legal, sometimes subsidized, and we should have as many as the market can bear). I'm suggesting that structuring your prediction markets as extremely long-term bets and using that as the core tool to fund science, which is not a marginal scenario, could lead to less openness of scientific results as compared with structuring prediction markets as short-term bets on the specific outcomes of individual studies. And I agree that prediction markets in some form would bring more information to the surface with regard to educational interventions.
Hedge fund employees cannot transfer knowledge that's not drectly inside their head, they get sued if they do that.
A Chinese scientist can email an American scientist with a question and get an answer free of charge, this is really unparalleled in business. Of course business needs to hoard some info to compete but it would be nice if info was disclosed, say after 10 years and when the business goes bankrupt without a buyer.
If you take bets on what the consensus answer to some question will be at a specific time in the future, you encourage researchers to keep their data and results secret, and to publish false results.
Academics already have many incentives to do those things.
There are many cheap things that can be done. Problem is, even less resources are devoted to doing such things.
Maybe trying to fix everything about science at once isn't the way to go.
We do have initiatives such as the [reproducibility-initiative](http://validation.scienceex.... Setting up a prediction market on the outcomes of those replication attempts should be relatively straightforward and not require much resources.
I have never made any claims to expertise.
But understand, the reliance on personal expertise is part of what's at issue. The reasoning behind prediction markets puts substantially greater emphasis on the ad hominem aspect of intellectual influence: more so than do I or mainstream intellectual history.
foragers were not communists, they were just small communes with few possessions that could be hoarded and no viable institutions to make hoarding possible.
They were militantly egalitarian, ganging up on any would be strong man.
You suggest there could be no domination because of the impracticability of hoarding. But domination was indeed possible as it had been the rule for our ape ancestors: domination was militantly resisted.
Info includes theories.
If Robin is a biased promoter then he is motivated by standard academic motives- pushing his idea- not by owning futures on some idea.
For info on how promotion works in financial markets, I look to financial markets. You look to a single academic who isn't even participating in a financial market.
"Personally, I think Robin cares far too much about being right. It isn't by virtue of being right that most contributions are made to intellectual life, which is a process of conversation."
Science is conversation constrained by certain ideas that tend to lead to greater accuracy. Norms have improved over time as science has adopted institutions that constrain BS and promote clarity. PM's are the next step.
Anyway, Stephen, you keep talking about how promotion affects financial markets, but your version of it is that held by the man on the street with no personal experience in them.
Foragers were not communists, they were just small communes with few possessions that could be hoarded and no viable institutions to make hoarding possible. They were for sure more socialist inclined than your average farmer but they never ahd to make the choice between capitalism and communism or something else.
Stopping population growth will lead to a higher GDP/capita but that will just make us more spoiled so we forget how scarcity has declined compared to the past: our ambitions will just grow with the level of wealth we have. Even if we have on average 5 Earth-like planets per person we'll still be inclined to think (and probably with good incentive reasons) that lazy people should have only 1 or 2 such planets and more productive members of society should perhaps get 10 (so yes, I do think we will eventually want to reduce inequality but we'll never want to eliminate it fully).
Seems to me overcoming scarcity requires only drastic limitation of population growth in the future. (This is what Robin says is impossible--even without ems.)
Overcoming scarcity doesn't mean unlimited abundance--only so much that egoistic striving can't comfortably be subordinated to social good. The Paleolithic foragers who had communism didn't overcome physics. It seems foraging lost to farming only when harsh scarcity began to prevail in the Mesolithic.
"Overcoming scarcity" would require breaking the laws of physics.
The not-so-distant future can be much more "socialist" than the present (basic income, education for all, that sort of thing) but it won't be communist, though of course new psychologies become a possibility in the far future and then communism could take over.
Communism doesn't "feel right"? When humankind has spent 90% of its time under a form of communism?
In a sense that's right; in Hansonian terms, farmer values come to prevail under scarcity. (Marx--and not even the Bolsheviks--envisioned communism succeeding in an isolated, backward country.)
It seems almost transparent that, if humanity ever overcomes scarcity, we'll be communist. (A cynical view of em theorizing might be that it's designed to demonstrate that scarcity will always be with us, that Malthus is eternal.)
And how would the existence of prediction markets dissuade sharing of bits of info at the margin?
I'm not (mainly) talking about sharing bits of information; rather, the sharing of understandings, theories, and counter-arguments. My claim is that widespread use of prediction markets (futarchy) would create a intelligentsia of promoters and hoarders.
The best way for us to understand an intellectual landscape dominated by prediction markets isn't to look at speculative markets generally (which only in the most indirect way address intellectual questions--for example, what is the main cause of inflation, not what will the inflation rate be in the next decade) but to look at how the orientation fostered by prediction markets affects the discourse of its advocates!
We have in Robin a great example of an intellectual shaped by the prediction-market mentality: ask how the quality of Robin's advocacy of prediction markets themselves has been affected by his devotion to them. Robin's uniqueness makes him interesting and socially useful, but do we want to see an intelligentsia composed of Robins?
What distinctive characteristics of Robin's discourse can be plausibly attributed to prediction markets (or, perhaps, to his already having had a mentality congruent with them)? I venture the following:
1. Robin never discusses the drawbacks of prediction markets. (Thus, followers like you end up denying there are any drawbacks--recent post.) While intellectuals are generally biased for their own views, intellectual status motivates most people to cultivate a degree open-mindedness. The prediction-market mentality seems to allow those who embrace it to justify being open promoters of their ideas.
2. Robin rarely (if ever) sets out the theoretical bases for his conclusions. I'd argue that doing so wouldn't serve promotional purposes; it would instead equip others to critique his conclusions.
3. Robin completely avoids issues related to his conclusions when they don't relate to promotion. Thus, he simply deigns not to comment on macro-economics.
You (with Moldbug) say leftism is advocacy of a scholarly dictatorship. I disagree: this is often the goal of Monomaniacalists, not (Utopianist) socialists/communists. ( http://tinyurl.com/6pt9eq5 ) [An extreme version is the Monomaniacalist dream of takeover by a "friendly AI."] But futarchy (or the widepread use of intellectual prediction markets) would turn scholars into traders.
Robin sees that folks don't really care about being correct, and he seeks to supply financial incentives. I think he fails to recognize that intellectual progress depends on the prevalance of the right intellectual norms much more than on the right individual incentives to be right. Personally, I think Robin cares far too much about being right. It isn't by virtue of being right that most contributions are made to intellectual life, which is a process of conversation.
Of course, in some sense, hedge funds transfer knowledge every time they trade based upon it, since their trades move the market price. So even if the public doesn't "learn" the information gathered in private, the public can perhaps infer such information.
The mere existence of prediction markets doesn't dissuade sharing information at the margin, of course. I'm not suggesting that prediction markets for science shouldn't exist (obviously they should; prediction markets should be legal, sometimes subsidized, and we should have as many as the market can bear). I'm suggesting that structuring your prediction markets as extremely long-term bets and using that as the core tool to fund science, which is not a marginal scenario, could lead to less openness of scientific results as compared with structuring prediction markets as short-term bets on the specific outcomes of individual studies. And I agree that prediction markets in some form would bring more information to the surface with regard to educational interventions.
Hedge fund employees cannot transfer knowledge that's not drectly inside their head, they get sued if they do that.
A Chinese scientist can email an American scientist with a question and get an answer free of charge, this is really unparalleled in business. Of course business needs to hoard some info to compete but it would be nice if info was disclosed, say after 10 years and when the business goes bankrupt without a buyer.
And hedge funds that learn things in private use them later on in the future, and transfer them to future employees.