[FRIAM] Nautilus: Investing Is More Luck Than Talent
Steven A Smith
sasmyth at swcp.com
Fri Jan 20 11:21:00 EST 2017
Robert -
I think I was mostly just being a deliberate curmudgeon. I am afraid
that public discourse has gotten rather layered, and my point was just
one of *many* examples of the way we deliberately delude ourselves (and
one another). Some have all but used up ideas like "Truth" and "Open
Mindnedness" by trying to co-opt it.
I am very leery of *all* news sources myself. I have had the
(mis)fortune of having a number of Right-Wingnut friends and family who
seem to be completely duped by the Rhetoric of the Right that make
claims for their news such as "No Spin" when at best their spin is the
anti-spin of the mainstream Lefties. And the whole rhetoric of "fact
based", and now another layer with "fake news". Anything *I* don't
agree with is probably 'fake news', and anything I believe in is "fact
based", etc. ad nauseum.
I am a fairly practiced "critical thinker", or at least a "knee jerk"
critical thinker in the sense that I can often recognize Hooey, even
when it supports my own pet theories. THAT seems to be the largest
enemy to proper critical thinking... a variation on confirmation
bias... And *all* media seems to cash in on that. They basically "tell
us what we want to hear", even if it appears "shocking" on the surface.
Being "shocked" seems to be a popular form of entertainment these days.
“If you don't read the newspaper, you're uninformed. If you read the
newspaper, you're mis-informed.”
"I always read the newspaper two weeks late, as it is much easier
because by that time most of what was reported has been demonstrated
to be false and the remainder is no longer relevant"
The above are often attributed to Sam Clemens but in fact are apparently
of unknown origin.
As a critical thinker (wannabe?), I am more interested in the *question*
than the *answer*. The main news media appears to traffic in answers
(often speculative of course)... I DO use them for parallax... and the
international sources provide some of that more better. But some of
the parallax seems to be false... the BBC, bless their heart, DOES tell
our story ('murrican) from a slightly different angle, but it often
feels to be just "our story" with a charming accent, over tea instead of
coffee.
Next to my crack about "having an open mind means just about anyone can
pour just about anything into it" is another mildly twisted aphorism of
"the advantage of sitting on the fence is that the view is better from
up there". I am often accused of not taking a stand, sitting on the
fence, etc. And this aphorism is a good defense/excuse if not actually
a reason. I prefer late binding of truth... why decide the answer to
any question prematurely? Especially if the question isn't well
formulated yet? Or if the *obvious* question is hiding a better
question nobody is asking?
On this cusp of the moment, the transition of formal power from Barack
Obama, to Donald Trump and the huge implications not only in these two
men's abilities, deep nature, and style, but between the tenor of those
who feel (or have felt) empowered by the iconography of the presumed
"leader of the free world". The thoughtful statesman fighting an
uphill battle against myriad forces vs the brash bully running over the
top of anyone who dares to question him? Or as others would see it,
the weakling of questionable origin (birthers, islamaphobes speaking
here), vs the strong, intelligent man who will "make this country great
again"... as if it's greatness was either "ever in question" or "ever
something to be proud of" or both?
So the question of the moment might be "will the Donald be a good
President?". Some think a better question is "could the Donald ever
conceivable be capable of being a good President?" while I am more prone
to "If the Donald can be an *effective* President, will I be in any way
pleased at the outcome of that?". There are a million corrolaries to
the above and I don't think they even begin to cover the space,
including "What kind of hell will the *rest* of the paranoid,
thoughtless, greedy world rain down on us in response to the Donald's
Narcissistic, Xenophobic, Misogynistic, Greedy, Bullying?"
I should probably take another day at Ojo today and soak out the
cortisol building up... I can read the results of his inaugural blather
in the papers or online tomorrow. Or maybe I could wait two weeks as
Sam Clemens is sometimes attributed to having done.
Carry on!
- Steve
PS. I wanted to respond to the original subject of the thread which I
apprehend as the question of pre-determination vs. free will. But that
was too hard of a "good question".
On 1/19/17 10:52 PM, Robert Wall wrote:
> Hi Steven,
>
> Point taken. I certainly did not mean it as you warned it could be
> taken to imply. By "open minded," I meant being open-minded to /other
> /points of view other than those, perhaps, to which we were inculcated
> by our own culture.
>
> As you pointed out, I said "Being open-minded does not mean you are
> brainwashed. Quite the opposite I would think ..." This is what I
> meant: open-mindedness =! prone to being brainwashed. [=! means not
> equal to]. So listening to alternative points of view, whatever the
> source, does not lead to a brainwashing if critical thinking is in
> force. Oops, now it sounds like I am saying I am always protected with
> superb critical thinking. Not so. I can be fooled, just like most
> everyone else. It's an on-going process over a lifetime, but not
> always starting with a blank slate. Eh? 🤐
>
> I do realize that openly saying that there is no harm in watching or
> listening to a foreign news station such as RT is, perhaps, not a
> rational thing to say in today's anti-Russian, anti-immigrant
> climate. I can't say or control what others will assume and only ask
> that they listen to and judge the message more than judging the origin
> of the messenger and where the listener might have been deluded by
> such an "open-minded" worldview. 😊
>
> I think I heard it said somewhere, "one man's propaganda is another
> man's truth." Not sure where.
>
> Inline image 1
>
> To me, being closed minded is to *not *listen to other points of
> view--calling it just propaganda--but only to stay within the bounds
> of one's own echo-chambered bubble. Moreover, I think the two kinds of
> mindedness are easily differentiated by just listening. When it comes
> to conspiracy theories--like the Russian hacking of the elections--or
> the like, you always have to ask, "Where is the evidence?" And then
> go from there ...
>
> Cheers,
>
> Robert
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 19, 2017 at 9:54 PM, Steven A Smith <sasmyth at swcp.com
> <mailto:sasmyth at swcp.com>> wrote:
>
> Robert -
>>
>> Being open-minded does not mean you are brainwashed. Quite the
>> opposite I would think ...
> I don't know if this is responsive to your specific intent, but
> when I first heard it, it was a powerful point and fit *way* too
> many people I know who *purport* to be "open minded" (after all,
> who actually *claims* to be otherwise?).
>
> /"Having an open mind, means just about anyone can pour just
> about anything into it!"
>
> /
>
> I find (too) often that people use the phrase "be open minded" as
> a jeer or an intimidation tactic meaning something more like "If
> you refuse to believe what I do, you are being close-minded". I
> *especially* find this happening among Trump supporters right
> now. But it also happens among my stronger conspiracy-theorist
> friends (who are, surprise, Trumpians!)... those who start with
> "fouride in the water is a gubbmin't mind-control plot" and tend
> to end up somewhere around "We are all descended from Atlanteans
> who were really aliens who gene-spliced in our special form of
> intelligence and other hidden powers most people can't access,
> because they don't believe!"
>
>
>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Jan 19, 2017 at 8:39 PM, Marcus Daniels
>> <marcus at snoutfarm.com <mailto:marcus at snoutfarm.com>> wrote:
>>
>> "The rigging is, IMHO, of not doing anything about the
>> unabated and disproportionate flow of wealth to the top and,
>> hence, giving rise to the resulting, ever-skewing,
>> descriptive Pareto distribution of wealth versus population.
>> It certainly does seem like an increasing biasing of the
>> metaphorical /fair /coin [e.g., the busted "trickle down"
>> metaphor of President Ronald Reagan]."
>>
>>
>> I think it depends in part on the source of the wealth and
>> how it is used. There's a qualitative difference between a
>> Google and a payday loan company that preys on the poor.
>> Are these wealthy people creating new high-paying jobs or
>> locking-in people to dead-end jobs like coal mining? Do they
>> have a vision of advancement of humanity (Gates) or just a
>> unnecessary assertion of the `need' for a
>> lowest-common-denominator dog-eat-dog view of things? How
>> does their wealth and power matter in the long run? It is at
>> least good that there isn't just one kind of billionaire,
>> like the sort that destroys the environment and enslaves people.
>>
>>
>> A problem with government is that the agency it gives people
>> is either very limited (you get food stamps so you can eat),
>> or it is also hierarchical like these enterprises (you don't
>> get much agency unless you fight your way up or are an
>> elected official). For people to truly be free means
>> creating a commons that facilitates other kinds of motivators
>> that are rewarding in more complex ways than just salary or
>> status. Universities don't really deliver on this, except
>> perhaps for some professors who are in that world for most of
>> their adult life.
>>
>>
>> I would say neoliberalism is trying to engineer biased coins
>> that land in a coordinated ways to build something more
>> complex. One way is with trade laws.
>>
>>
>> Marcus
>>
>>
>> P.S. RT is the Russian Propaganda news outlet. Of course,
>> they'd have their own motives for wanting to diminish Chinese
>> power.
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com
>> <mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com>> on behalf of Robert Wall
>> <wallrobert7 at gmail.com <mailto:wallrobert7 at gmail.com>>
>> *Sent:* Thursday, January 19, 2017 4:57:14 PM
>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
>> *Subject:* [FRIAM] Nautilus: Investing Is More Luck Than Talent
>> This is just an exploratory thought piece to try in this
>> forum ... please skip if it seems, right off the bat, as
>> being too thought-full ... 😴😊
>>
>> Does *Pareto's Principle
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_principle> *(with the
>> attending, so-called Power Law
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_law>) provide good
>> _moral_ justification for an amped-up progressive
>> tax strategy or a reverse-discriminating set of rebalancing
>> policies [e.g., changing the probabilities for the
>> "everyman"]? And, is the argument one of *morality *or one
>> of *necessity*? That's what this thread and the subject
>> /Nautilus /article intend to explore, especially with the
>> events that will begin the next four years tomorrow.
>>
>> /Nautilus/: Investing Is More Luck Than Talent
>> <http://nautil.us/issue/44/luck/investing-is-more-luck-than-talent?utm_source=Nautilus&utm_campaign=f5f998a451-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_01_18&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_dc96ec7a9d-f5f998a451-56531089> (January
>> 19, 2017).
>>
>> /The surprising message of the statistics of wealth
>> distribution./
>>
>>
>> /I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not
>> to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, /
>> /neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of
>> understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill, /
>> /but time and chance happeneth to them all./(Ecclesiastes
>> 9:11)
>>
>>
>> [*an introductory aside*: As computational statisticians, we
>> love our simulations ... and our coin tosses. 😎 We are
>> always mindful of *bias *... as, say, apparent with the
>> ever-widening wealth gap. Money, Money, Money
>> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETxmCCsMoD0> ...] 😊
>>
>> Inline image 1
>>
>>
>> So, as described in the subject /Nautilus /article, Pareto's
>> Principle, descriptively seen so often in nature, seems to
>> imply that the current widening wealth gap is, well,
>> "natural?" Judging by its prevalence in most all rich
>> societies, it does seem so. However, remembering that this
>> sorting process works even with /fair /coin tosses in
>> investments and gambling, this process phenomenon with its
>> biased outcomes seems to occur in many places and on many
>> levels ...
>>
>> For example, we find this aspect of /luck in
>> nature/ elsewhere in biological processes; from /Wikipedia
>> /... /Chance and Necessity: Essay on the Natural Philosophy
>> of Modern Biology/ is a 1970 book by Nobel Prize winner
>> Jacques Monod, interpreting the processes of evolution to
>> show that life is only the result of natural processes by
>> "pure chance." The basic tenet of this book is that systems
>> in nature with molecular biology, such as enzymatic
>> biofeedback loops [/metabolisms/] can be explained without
>> having to invoke final causality [e.g., Intelligent Design].
>>
>> Usually, relatively very few winners and many, many losers.
>> Phenotypical luck or luck in tectonic location?
>>
>> According to the introduction the book's title was
>> inspired by a line attributed to Democritus
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democritus>, "Everything
>> existing in the universe is the fruit of chance and
>> necessity."
>>
>>
>> But, is there a /necessity /to Pareto's Principle? To answer
>> this I must defer to my theoretical mathematician friends who
>> so often look to Plato for such answers. 🤔😊 My thought is
>> that the necessity comes from a need to, perhaps
>> teleologically, react to it ... as the planet's only
>> available potential intelligent designers ... the purpose
>> being, on some scale, Darwinian-level survival.
>>
>> And, this aspect of /fate by chance/ is also reasoned in the
>> Pulitzer-winning/ Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human
>> Societies is a 1997/, a transdisciplinary non-fiction book by
>> Jared Diamond, professor of geography and physiology at the
>> University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
>>
>>
>> The book attempts to explain why Eurasian civilizations
>> (including North Africa) have survived and conquered
>> others, while arguing against the idea that Eurasian
>> hegemony is due to any form of Eurasian intellectual,
>> moral, or inherent genetic superiority. Diamond argues
>> that the gaps in power and technology between human
>> societies originate primarily in environmental
>> differences, which are amplified by various positive
>> feedback loops. When cultural or genetic differences have
>> favored Eurasians (for example, written language or the
>> development among Eurasians of resistance to endemic
>> diseases), he asserts that these advantages occurred
>> because of the influence of geography on societies and
>> cultures (for example, by facilitating commerce and trade
>> between different cultures) and were not inherent in the
>> Eurasian genomes. [Wikipedia]
>>
>>
>> The luck of geography. So then, should the more fortunate
>> nations be more progressively taxed? Maybe we should ask
>> Greece? Or see what Germany has to say? Followers of
>> egalitarianism would argue yes. Followers of Ayn Rand's
>> capitalism or her Objectivism [like Speaker Paul Ryan] would
>> argue no. I think most of the rest of us fall somewhere in
>> between; that is, not sure. So, let's go on ...
>>
>> *Is the (economic) game rigged* then, as Bernie Sanders and
>> Elizabeth Warren have insisted? Personally, I would say
>> absolutely yes, and *neoliberalism *is the underlying
>> philosophy of the rigging process
>> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9wUGxgEFsw> [hear just the
>> 1st 12 minutes, if you watch]. But, maybe this political
>> ideology is just one that is eventually spawned by a
>> conspicuous need for moralistic or even Randian
>> justification, by the winners, for its resulting
>> destructiveness--as we so often hear, "wealth accumulation is
>> based on hard work and talent." So, intelligent design?
>>
>> The rigging is, IMHO, of not doing anything about the
>> unabated and disproportionate flow of wealth to the top and,
>> hence, giving rise to the resulting, ever-skewing,
>> descriptive Pareto distribution of wealth versus population.
>> It certainly does seem like an increasing biasing of the
>> metaphorical /fair /coin [e.g., the busted "trickle down"
>> metaphor of President Ronald Reagan].
>>
>> Going forward, maybe we need to think about this neoliberal
>> meme as the next four years, with a* President Donald
>> Trump*, begin tomorrow ... while also remembering that
>> *morality *is a human concept or "invention." Or is it?Or,
>> does that even matter?! Perhaps, morality is just a
>> necessity ... but what are its goals ... dare I say its
>> "purpose?" When did it emerge? With consciousness? How did
>> it emerge? By chance, as Monad and Democritus would insist?
>> *
>> *
>> *_Conjecture_*: *It would seem that morality's human purpose
>> is to check, slow, or rebalance the effects of the Pareto
>> phenomenon in social and economic processes.* Wealth has
>> always been disproportionately distributed. Surely, just like
>> the "selfish gene," morality arose out of self-interest; so
>> it arose with prerequisite consciousness and *not
>> *necessarily just with human consciousness [e.g., we see
>> evidence of "morality" in other primate social systems]. As a
>> system model, neoliberalism is connected with a positive
>> feedback loop to morality and with a negative feedback loop
>> to social stability. I think that there is a tipping-point
>> distribution of wealth versus population
>> <https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2014-02-04/is-inequality-approaching-a-tipping-point->.
>> *_
>> _*
>> *_Conclusion_*: The above conjecture is borne up by chance
>> and necessity. The necessity is manifested by the need to
>> rebalance the outcomes of the game [e.g., wealth or
>> opportunity] every now and then, in order to ensure social
>> stability. This just seems like a brain-dead conclusion that
>> even Warren Buffet and Bill Gates get. But will Trump?
>> Strong critics of Hillary Clinton imply that she, like her
>> husband, would surely have strengthened the negative feedback
>> effect of neoliberalism toward their own self-interest and
>> toward worsening social stability, IMHO. The results of the
>> November election are a kind of testament to this conclusion.
>> In an unexpected way, we may have a /chance /with Trump to
>> bring even more /necessary /awareness to the aforementioned
>> system model that has often played out in human history and
>> as recounted in Jared Diamond's book-length essays.
>> Bernie-style revolution? Perhaps.
>>
>> So, that is the idea of how /chance /and /necessity /fits
>> here in "the game.". Now, let's dig into this idea of
>> *morality *a bit more and how it fits in with the need for a
>> different kind of evolution, not biological, but *conscious
>> evolution*:
>>
>> This comment from a /Quora /article on this subject
>> titled Is morality merely a social construct or something
>> more?
>> <https://www.quora.com/Is-morality-merely-a-social-construct-or-something-more> is
>> notable:
>>
>> Mindaugas Kuprionis
>> <https://www.quora.com/profile/Mindaugas-Kuprionis>,
>> works at CERN
>>
>> Written 17 Sep 2010
>> <https://www.quora.com/Is-morality-merely-a-social-construct-or-something-more/answer/Mindaugas-Kuprionis>
>>
>>
>> Just recently Edge.org <https://www.edge.org/>held a
>> conference titled "The New Science of Morality
>> <https://www.edge.org/event/the-new-science-of-morality>".
>> Consensus statement signed by several scholars (list
>> below) was such:
>>
>>
>> 1) Morality is a natural phenomenon and a cultural
>> phenomenon
>>
>> 2) Many of the psychological building blocks of
>> morality are innate
>>
>> 3) Moral judgments are often made intuitively, with
>> little deliberation or conscious weighing of evidence
>> and alternatives
>>
>> 4) Conscious moral reasoning plays multiple roles in
>> our moral lives
>>
>> 5) Moral judgments and values are often at odds with
>> actual behavior
>>
>> 6) Many areas of the brain are recruited for moral
>> cognition, yet there is no "moral center" in the brain
>>
>> 7) Morality varies across individuals and cultures
>>
>> 8) Moral systems support human flourishing, to
>> varying degrees [aside-- so morality may be akin to
>> metabolic systems at the level of society
>> --regulating feedback loops of sorts]
>>
>> [*aside*-- Fyodor Dostoyevsky's /Crime and
>> Punishment /comes to mind. Under this
>> eight-point new science, how would we judge the
>> "higher-purpose" actions of Rodion Raskolnikov?]
>>
>>
>> So if it is true that there is no distributional *purpose *to
>> l/uck /other than a mechanistic, long-run, teleonomic
>> <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleonomy> sorting mechanism
>> of outcomes in accordance with a Power Law, then should there
>> be a /necessary/, periodic re-sorting of the initial
>> conditions now skewed by /chance /... like with a deck of
>> cards before the next deal ...? 🤔 All poker players would
>> insist on no less. Don't we all insist on a /fair /game?
>> It's an interesting question, IMHO.
>> Yes, I know; lots to unpack here. Sorry. Nonetheless, I
>> thought the /Nautilus /article was quite thought-provoking as
>> they always seem to be.
>> Cheers,
>>
>> -Robert
>>
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