Wednesday, August 31, 2016

A joke about efficient markets, and a deep truth about life

I just came across a joke I first heard in an introductory economics lecture. Back then it didn't notice the depth of it, though. Here it is:
A professor and an investor are walking down the street when the investor sees a $20 bill and stoops down to pick it up. The professor says "Don’t bother. If it were really there, someone would have picked it up already."
(The joke is that markets are supposed to be efficient, so investors can't make any money as everything is "priced in" into any speculative asset already. The professor believes that markets are efficient because that's what his theories says. Meanwhile, investors make money.)

Now, the question to you to think about is: Do you recognize the problem with the thought process of the professor, and notice how this is evident in reality? For extra credit, think of all the bullshit you are surrounded with on a daily basis. I am not only talking about politics. Even in allegedly high-IQ jobs people throw around bullshit phrases like "best practices" in order to justify borderline moronic processes. It's as if every excuse is good enough as long as it lets them avoid using their brain. You think I'm too radical? Read up what has become of the companies that were featured in Peters' In Search of Excellence.

The root cause is dogmatism, paired with laziness. Sadly, there are often perverse incentive structures in place that only encourage this behavior. It is everywhere you look. The blue pill virgin laughs at the guy with 100 notches, claiming that it is "ridiculous to not want to have a girlfriend". The slimy realtor tells you that "housing prices always go up". The douche from your bank somehow tells the same about stocks. The politician claims that bringing in two million uneducated brutes from some of the most backward regions on the planet will boost the economy. Your girlfriend throws a fit because "if you loved me you would take me on a fourth trip this year".

Thus, blind dogma, paired with stupidity, keeps people from seeing the truth. The dogmatic professor never picks up a $20 bill because to him it's not there. To him he is just imagining it. The bitchy girlfriend never changes her behavior because all the dudes who didn't pump and dump her are spineless chumps. The politician gets a nice cheque from Soros' Open Society Foundation, so unrestrained mass immigration is great. He's doing good work and even gets paid for it! The dimwit from the bank with his shitty MBA from a lower-ranked business school doesn't know enough about financial markets to form an opinion, while his realtor buddy probably wasn't even smart enough to crack 8th grade maths but who is still a genius compared to his recruiter buddy who calls up engineers telling them about "great oppatunitees wiff a groin' tech 'ouse". And of course the blue-balled blue-pilled loser is too concerned about the opinion of his equally spineless friends who would drop him the moment a single mom in their late 30s couldn't find a better host to leech off.

The morons currently have the upper hand. I mean this quite literally. It is absolutely mind-boggling how incredibly stupid some of the most powerful people in the world are. The average person is a fucking moron anyway. It is as if they all live in a complete make-believe world. However, I think we are currently seeing the beginning of a push back. Egalitarianism has fucked up the West pretty badly, though, so it is dubious whether we will be able to recover.


What do you think? Let me know in the comments below!
(Also, if you’ve got a comment that is off-topic or only tangentially related to this article, then please post in the most recent Open Thread. Thank you.)

12 comments:

  1. Your post shares a lot in common with another Aaron, i.e. Aaron Clarey (captaincapitalism.blogspot.ca)

    Agree with your thought on clueless, stupid leaders. Canada has Justin Trudeau. The left-wing libtards and their media (led by CBC, a lame parallel to UK's BBC) love everything he does.

    Yet people wonder why a "racist" and [insert SJW attack word] like Trump has such popularity.

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  2. I find it very easy to dismiss people who cannot speak plainly these days. The average person can be so blindly engorged with the fantasy and romance of ideas that they don't bother to cross examine them.

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    1. For many, idea are like fashions. Today, the unthinking masses are enamored with leftists ideas. If egalitarianism manages to burn the West down, the very same morons will quickly spout conservative platitudes.

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  3. Not having a good day Aaron?

    Peter's first book was really awful, and his later books were worse. In person, he came across as a unhinged lunatic. But it was a big fad at the time, even when I was doing my MBA.

    Well, common sense is sadly not all that common. Evidence based thinking requires research, and critical thinking can make you uncomfortable. Given that people gravitate to whatever is easiest, most people do not do much thinking. But, while egalitarianism has not worked too well for us, but we have to bear in mind that monarchies, dictatorships and feudal systems tend to do even worse.

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    1. In which context did you meet Peters, if I may ask?

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    2. He was the celebrity speaker at a business conference I was at some years ago. I did not personally meet him but I listened to him for over an hour. I thought he was odd and his ideas were incoherent.

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    3. The goood and the sad thing: Thats just your opinion. Nothing more, nothing less and we can discuss about.

      I do read 2-3 books per month. Some books are well written, some are awful, but its all printed knowledge. For example if you read a book that talks about economics and has been written ten yrs ago, yes some facts are wrong, but do understand the author and his mindset, i have to read it. But thats something i can only know if i read it. If I take a look at the recessions from peter's book on amazon and other blogs, they're not so bad that his book is not worth a try.

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  4. Nassim Nicholas Taleb coined the term Intellectual-Yet-Idiot for these people: http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-06-26/nassim-taleb-slams-worlds-intellectual-yet-idiot-class

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    1. The problem with the class of "intellectuals" is that they are mostly a bunch of jokers, circle-jerking inept fools. As a society, we would improve tremendously if we razed 95 % of humanities departments into the ground. It's all just to keep millions of students off the unemployment register for a few extra years, and a few hundred thousand professors for life. 95% is probably far too generous. If you consider history, you'll find that the most important intellectuals were not humanities professors who were busy fellating each other.

      Hayek called intellectuals "second-hand thinkers of ideas", which is a very fitting description. Given the massive retardation in the tertiary sector, today's intellectuals are commonly second-hand thinkers of ideas with third-rate minds, though.

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    2. The world is collapsing because there hasn't been a massive societal culling, an event that demolishes the statu quo and shakens the mere foundations of our civilization.

      War soon, fellow Сталкер.

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  5. I recently read the german book "Der betörende Glanz der Dummheit" from Esther Vilar. Most of her books are more than 20 yrs old and some theses are wrong, but overall it has a lot of truth in it. Sad thing: none of her books are translated in english.

    Esther talks in her book "Der betörende Glanz..." (in english would it probably translated in "the beguiling glance of dumbness") about the different facts of dumbness in society. She defines dumbness as the opposite of intelligence and intelligence as the combination of fantasy plus sensibility. We often call a person who knows a lot as intelligent or smart, but thats acquaired knowledge.

    So a person who is fanciless and insensitive would be based on her equation called dumb. Dumb people are more successful, because they are not overthinking things too much. For example: If my plans are career and to climb up in my job, being overly sensitive and fanciful with thoughts like "What would other think of this?" or "Employee XY is more capable of that than I..." would prevent me from my plan. Even climbing up in military, politics,...being "dumb" is an advantage.

    I'm pretty relaxed if i take a look at the media and the politics nowadays by thinking that those people are dumb - have always be - have no structure in their thinking and things they say have never been well-conceived. To successfully get by, i have to think for myself and make the best of the situations.

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    1. Great point. Her most known book "The Manipulated Man" was also translated in English.

      I'd also recommend her debate in German television against Alice Schwarzer on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=py2b1g73bt4 (English subs)

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