It is conceivable that I could get more than $5′s worth (here meaning my subjective and relative sense of what money is worth) of entertainment out of a $5 lottery ticket.
It certainly is concievable and in the world of your thought experiment buying a lottery ticket would in fact be rational. However such things don’t exist in reality. People who buy lottery tickets don’t do so because of entertainment value but because of a hope they would win. That’s connotaionally implied by the term “lottery ticket”. And therefore it’s correct to use it as an example of common rationality failure.
A more realistic somewhat rational reason to buy lottery tickets would be when the gains of the lottery company are used to fund charitable projects and someone would reason that buying a lottery ticket increases the jackpot and thereby makes the lottery ticket more attractive to a lot of irrational people and thus increase the gains for the charity.
Suppose Sam plays the lottery because when Sam buys a $5 lottery ticket, Sam enjoys the period until the drawing quite a lot.
Yes, you’re right, this is entirely because Sam hopes the ticket will win, but the fact remains that Sam does enjoy it: Sam can indulge in pleasant fantasies about being a billionaire, etc.
Now, you may argue that the only reason Sam enjoys it is because Sam is being irrationally hopeful, and I would agree. If Sam were more rational, Sam would not enjoy buying the ticket so much. (I would say the same thing about many forms of entertainment.)
But I think that’s orthogonal to the OP. Given that Sam enjoys it, one can ask whether it makes sense to spend $5 for that enjoyment, the same way one can ask whether it makes sense to spend $5 for a bottle of wine.
Are you really claiming that there are no Sams in the real world? Or have I misunderstood you?
ow, you may argue that the only reason Sam enjoys it is because Sam is being irrationally hopeful, and I would agree. If Sam were more rational, Sam would not enjoy buying the ticket so much. (I would say the same thing about many forms of entertainment.)
But I think that’s orthogonal to the OP. Given that Sam enjoys it, one can ask whether it makes sense to spend $5 for that enjoyment, the same way one can ask whether it makes sense to spend $5 for a bottle of wine.
That’s an interesting difference on the word “enjoy”. If we use “enjoy” as synonymous to “activating our pleasure center” and buying a lottery ticket does that cheaper than using drugs, then Sam does enjoy buying a lottery ticket. But that would be more like wireheading than what I would think of as “actual entertainment”.
I would think of wireheading as clearly irrational and going to the opera when you genuinly enjoy it as clearly rational. Maybe the border between them isn’t that clear cut but I think of buying lottery tickets to indulge in fantasies about being rich as more on the wireheading side.
I would suggest as a test to distinguish the two whether you would also enjoy merely talking about the thing. Would Sam enjoy talking about buying lottery tickets and the suspense until the numbers are drawn or would he only enjoy talking about what he would do when rich? He won’t get the latter with lottery tickets. But if someone enjoys talking about opera, he will get what he wants when going to an actual opera.
I am not sure I understand what you mean by “actual entertainment.”
I have been in situations where I realized that this thing that I’ve been doing, ostensibly for entertainment purposes, is no longer entertaining and has not been for some time. For example, I’ve been playing a video game but haven’t actually been enjoying it for a while.
That’s more or less the referent I have for something not being actual entertainment, while still being sufficiently entertainment-like to deserve the label. (Dropping an anvil on my foot is also not actual entertainment, but it would be very strange to describe it that way.)
I’ve never wireheaded, but given my understanding of the idea I would call it actual entertainment. Whether it’s a rational thing to do or not is a whole other question: that depends on its costs (including long-term opportunity costs).
It seems very strange to me that my judgment of whether Sam actually enjoys buying a lottery ticket should depend on whether there are cheaper entertainments available. Ditto going to the opera. I would agree that doing either when there are other things with lower costs that Sam enjoys more is imperfectly rational, but I would say that whether Sam actually enjoys them or not doesn’t depend on that.
The “talking-about” test seems odd to me… there are many activities I enjoy that I don’t necessarily enjoy talking about. Are you claiming that I therefore don’t actually enjoy the activities, I just think I do?
(I’m also not sure why you think Sam won’t enjoy talking about buying lottery tickets, necessarily, though I agree that it seems plausible that Sam would not.)
I am having a hard time coming up with a scenario in which a sharp, large decrease in my standard of living makes wireheading a more sensible thing for me to do.
I do sympathize with the urge to do it even if it isn’t sensible—ditto the urge to drink habitually, have unprotected sex with strangers, faff about on the Internet while at work, or shoot myself in the head—but I can’t quite grasp that as a long-term plan, either.
A more realistic somewhat rational reason to buy lottery tickets would be when the gains of the lottery company are used to fund charitable projects and someone would reason that buying a lottery ticket increases the jackpot and thereby makes the lottery ticket more attractive to a lot of irrational people and thus increase the gains for the charity.
The fraction is really not very large. Camelot (the lottery operator in the UK) has in fact been specifically enjoined from stating or implying that buying a lottery ticket meaningfully contributes to charity.
LotteryWest runs the West Australian lottery and the fraction they donate to charity is enourmous, so that’s a generalisation that does not necessarily hold true everywhere.
It certainly is concievable and in the world of your thought experiment buying a lottery ticket would in fact be rational. However such things don’t exist in reality. People who buy lottery tickets don’t do so because of entertainment value but because of a hope they would win. That’s connotaionally implied by the term “lottery ticket”. And therefore it’s correct to use it as an example of common rationality failure.
A more realistic somewhat rational reason to buy lottery tickets would be when the gains of the lottery company are used to fund charitable projects and someone would reason that buying a lottery ticket increases the jackpot and thereby makes the lottery ticket more attractive to a lot of irrational people and thus increase the gains for the charity.
Eh?
Suppose Sam plays the lottery because when Sam buys a $5 lottery ticket, Sam enjoys the period until the drawing quite a lot.
Yes, you’re right, this is entirely because Sam hopes the ticket will win, but the fact remains that Sam does enjoy it: Sam can indulge in pleasant fantasies about being a billionaire, etc.
Now, you may argue that the only reason Sam enjoys it is because Sam is being irrationally hopeful, and I would agree. If Sam were more rational, Sam would not enjoy buying the ticket so much. (I would say the same thing about many forms of entertainment.)
But I think that’s orthogonal to the OP. Given that Sam enjoys it, one can ask whether it makes sense to spend $5 for that enjoyment, the same way one can ask whether it makes sense to spend $5 for a bottle of wine.
Are you really claiming that there are no Sams in the real world? Or have I misunderstood you?
That’s an interesting difference on the word “enjoy”. If we use “enjoy” as synonymous to “activating our pleasure center” and buying a lottery ticket does that cheaper than using drugs, then Sam does enjoy buying a lottery ticket. But that would be more like wireheading than what I would think of as “actual entertainment”.
I would think of wireheading as clearly irrational and going to the opera when you genuinly enjoy it as clearly rational. Maybe the border between them isn’t that clear cut but I think of buying lottery tickets to indulge in fantasies about being rich as more on the wireheading side.
I would suggest as a test to distinguish the two whether you would also enjoy merely talking about the thing. Would Sam enjoy talking about buying lottery tickets and the suspense until the numbers are drawn or would he only enjoy talking about what he would do when rich? He won’t get the latter with lottery tickets. But if someone enjoys talking about opera, he will get what he wants when going to an actual opera.
I am not sure I understand what you mean by “actual entertainment.”
I have been in situations where I realized that this thing that I’ve been doing, ostensibly for entertainment purposes, is no longer entertaining and has not been for some time. For example, I’ve been playing a video game but haven’t actually been enjoying it for a while.
That’s more or less the referent I have for something not being actual entertainment, while still being sufficiently entertainment-like to deserve the label. (Dropping an anvil on my foot is also not actual entertainment, but it would be very strange to describe it that way.)
I’ve never wireheaded, but given my understanding of the idea I would call it actual entertainment. Whether it’s a rational thing to do or not is a whole other question: that depends on its costs (including long-term opportunity costs).
It seems very strange to me that my judgment of whether Sam actually enjoys buying a lottery ticket should depend on whether there are cheaper entertainments available. Ditto going to the opera. I would agree that doing either when there are other things with lower costs that Sam enjoys more is imperfectly rational, but I would say that whether Sam actually enjoys them or not doesn’t depend on that.
The “talking-about” test seems odd to me… there are many activities I enjoy that I don’t necessarily enjoy talking about. Are you claiming that I therefore don’t actually enjoy the activities, I just think I do?
(I’m also not sure why you think Sam won’t enjoy talking about buying lottery tickets, necessarily, though I agree that it seems plausible that Sam would not.)
one of my motivations for accumulating resources is the ability to wirehead myself if things look to be going down the drain.
Can you expand on what you mean by “things go down the drain,” here?
sharp, large decrease in standard of living.
I am having a hard time coming up with a scenario in which a sharp, large decrease in my standard of living makes wireheading a more sensible thing for me to do.
I do sympathize with the urge to do it even if it isn’t sensible—ditto the urge to drink habitually, have unprotected sex with strangers, faff about on the Internet while at work, or shoot myself in the head—but I can’t quite grasp that as a long-term plan, either.
The fraction is really not very large. Camelot (the lottery operator in the UK) has in fact been specifically enjoined from stating or implying that buying a lottery ticket meaningfully contributes to charity.
LotteryWest runs the West Australian lottery and the fraction they donate to charity is enourmous, so that’s a generalisation that does not necessarily hold true everywhere.