Re: Fear of Letting People Get Things They Want

From: Adrian Tymes (wingcat@pacbell.net)
Date: Sat Sep 23 2000 - 20:42:37 MDT


Robin Hanson wrote:
> xgl wrote:
> > interesting. i would give it to 'em, pretty much regardless of the amount.
>
> You're the only person to have explicitly stated you'd give more than abillion
> - two people went up to that point then stopped there. I'll state
> here for the record that I'd give it to them regardless of the amount as
> well.

Just so you're not alone: I, too, would say yes regardless of amount.
As was said, since the alternative is that the resources/whatever
remain undiscovered (and thus, practically nonexistant), then this is
the equivalent of asking, "Do you want a billion dollars injected into
the world economy that otherwise would never be injected?" Like *duh*
someone's going to start out in charge of it; it just happens that one
person will start out, rather than spreading this.

As for the "recipient will never know I was responsible"...well, I could
certainly *claim* I was responsible, but I've got absolutely no proof.
Therefore, the recipient can't ever know for sure that I was the source,
even if I claimed to be. (And for a totally random stranger...what am I
gonna do, show up on vis doorstep and pronounce that ve got rich because
of something I said, so would ve give me a chunk of vis money please?)



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Oct 02 2000 - 17:38:46 MDT