IMO NO - if you, like me, explicitly want to bet in (even loose) accordance with your credence, or also like me, use MM for CBT* so that failing to believe in yourself has a real fake cost, then betting against yourself is sometimes the obvious correct thing to do. To extend that to ruining your own personal goals for internet charity marbles would be going too far, obviously, but who even does that?

*(not that one, you goof)

@Lorxus *(then which one?? 😭 )

@Stralor Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.

@Lorxus 😅 that's the one I thought of first, and then was confused

It is bad manners because people expect you to bet towards your goals (which should be hard to achieve). All the use cases below are OK, if you explicitly say you are doing it. The fact that you have to make it explicit is the reason why it is default “bad manners”.

I wouldn’t ban. I would just want people to explicit about their reasons for doing it.

I see a lot of utility in betting in such a way as to encourage traders. Maybe it's just me but I'm less concerned about losses on my own questions if they lead to engagement and are mitigated by bonuses. Sometimes you pick a personal goal that others don't want to be seen as not supporting, or that they think is more likely than you would have guessed, and I find that NO bets on such goals can be a win/win; either you reach your goal or you get a small consolation prize.

And in some other cases you frankly don't have as much control as you'd like, so betting is a way to gain some edge and minor market-making profit and signal insider knowledge. This case should be less common, but I don't begrudge it if the market is given time to respond and the creator doesn't aggressively gobble up all excess liquidity with each move.

In total, it hardly seems like BM for providing stakes for traders to bet against, so long as there's no intent to deceive or sabotage.

To give an example where it can be entirely legit: my Groudon market. It’s a goal I do want to achieve, but there is a random chance element that means it’s far from guaranteed. It’d be entirely consistent for me to bet NO while still trying my hardest to achieve the goal.

Another example I’ve been thinking about is a “will my child become an astronaut” question. I want one of them to do that, but it’d be deeply insensible for me to vote YES at anything lower than a couple of percent.

https://manifold.markets/Noit/will-i-catch-a-shiny-groudon-in-the-4fdc64d125b6?r=Tm9pdA

Will I catch a shiny Groudon in the next two weeks? Round 2

42% chance. I’m playing Pokémon Ruby on a Game Boy Advance, original hardware, no mods or overclocks or anything beyond a screen mod and a new shell. I’ve saved in front of Groudon and am soft resetting to shiny hunt. The odds of a shiny are 1 in 8192. I can turn around two reloads in a minute. I m…

What behaviour would you specifically be hoping to curtail by banning it (socially or via actual moderation policy)?

I think personal goals markets should be minor investments at most. If someone put M1000 or more into their own personal goals market I think I’d be concerned about that person misaligning their incentives and putting themselves at some unnecessary additional stress.

I’d maybe support a cap on self-investment in those markets.

The main reason of a personal goal market is to help you achieve said goal right?

It holds you accountable and give you some extra motivation, assuming you’re being honest.

Betting against yourself just feels like it undermines the whole point and as a general rule seems pretty bad manners.

@Alfie other purposes of personal goal markets might include determining the feasibility of a goal, or learning how various things influence the probability of achieving the goal.

@JonathanRay fair point, I hadn’t thought about those options. Still they might be more like exceptions to a general rule. Almost every personal goal market I’ve seen seems to be the type I described in my earlier comment.

@Alfie Another main reason is market manipulation to boost profits and league standings. Assuming honesty when competing with random strangers on the internet for points is not a good strategy.

@AlexbGoode If you’re going to take that attitude then you may as well just ban all personal goal markets or any market that can’t be verified.

BMing since day one

I would generally be happier if market makers for unverifiable events would not bet in their markets. If you do have to bet in your market for personal accountability reasons, you should bet in such a manner that motivates you to succeed.

@JohnSmithb9be I want to bet in accordance with my opinions but this format is whalebait.

In general, I try to bet towards my true beliefs. If I've set something as a personal goal, it's far more important to me to achieve the goal than to win Mana betting and then not achieving the goal. So, I don't think it distorts my incentives in a substantial way. I assume this is mostly the same for other people, so I don't consider it bad etiquette.

I think that the default expectation should be that you don’t. However, I think it’s fine if you make clear up front that you may bet either way in the market, it’s perfectly fine manners-wise