🏅 Top traders

https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/28/football/iran-soccer-family-threats-intl-spt/index.html

I think the question "will the players face repercussions from their government" would be an ok question. But I think betting on whether a person will be harmed by anything is a bit too much.

I know it's fake money, but with real money this bet would be an incentive to harm people. And even though I don't think that a person crazy enough to harm someone for mana exists, maybe we should not take the chance.

@enemel To an extent, every market is an incentive to hurt someone.

@kolotom99 I don't really have the time to think of every market possible so I'll just agree you're technically right. But let's just compare our two questions and see what you would do to interfere.

"Will Iranian players return home safely?": Pretty easy, harm a player.

"Will the players face repercussions from their government?": Okay here is the plan. Let's see, am I part of the Iranian government? No? Damn, then maybe I could become part of the Iranian government? Oh I have 4 weeks max? Seems unlikely. Maybe get rid of the current government? People are trying that and it seems very difficult? Fuck dude. I think no matter how high the price is, this seems kind of impossible.

So even with the strongest steelman of you position, I think you are wrong. And I don't think you would agree with someone who said: "to an extent, every action I take is killing someone". This someone might be technically right (butterfly effect or some shit), but I think you would still want them to have consequences for driving into a parade with his car.

well said

@kolotom99 Thanks, but you seem to still disagree since you have not changed the question. Here is a weird self-nuke I would offer to you, if you agree for me to do it.

Option 1: I report your market and wait for manifold to respond. If they do nothing I create a market called "Will manifold markets user Tomek K return home safely?". I am pretty sure that would get me banned. If they do nothing again, I will leave you alone and start debating them on their community guidelines. If they ban me, I'm gone and I can only hope you get the point.

I do not really want to do that so here are the other three options:

Option 2: You give me a good explanation on why I'm wrong

Option 3: You change your question

Option 4: You ignore me, I'll report this and I'll be annoying you further every time I see a market of yours, I have a moral problem with. Free speech and stuff.

My favorite Option is Option 2. I'd rather learn something then any of the other options. But the choice is yours. You can also add an option if you want to.

@enemel There isn't any rule against markets about whether people are harmed (there is a rule against acting with malicious intent, though). There's been some discussion about it - see https://manifold.markets/BenjaminIkuta/will-prediction-markets-on-individu for example.

The scenario you describe (bet yes, and harm a player to collect profits) I believe to be highly unlikely, and I believe is reasonably dealt with by the laws we already have against assault and battery.

(Also, re making a market on Tomek - I believe if you make a market about another person who isn't a public figure and they don't want it, they can probably get it taken down, although I'm not sure what the policy is on this.)

@jack it's pretty late where I live, so I should probably go to bed soon (That last post might reflect that, bit unhinged). I'll definitely get back to you on that when I read all the arguments and thought about them.

Good morning Jack, as promised, here is my response. I'm sorry for the size of my reply, but this topic is important to me.

First, a question. In this comment (https://manifold.markets/BenjaminIkuta/will-prediction-markets-on-individu#Yk3BcyHZK9Wx2RL5gpjb) you argue that prediction markets on life and death are valuable. I would like to know the value to see, whether this value might outweigh the value of not having them. And I will try to show that value in the last part.

The Tomek market

I would argue a market on a public person is worse, because Tomek has anonymity, insofar as most people do not know his real identity. But you seem to have the same intuition, this market would probably be taken down.

I don’t have a strong stance on the public person/ private person argument, but I don’t really understand at which point it is your choice to enter the public light. The public decides that.

Laws

Laws are not the same internationally, and I don’t know how well people in Iran for example are protected by these.

Fraud markets and other illegal/immoral things

You argue that fraud markets have the same problem as a market on life and death. I disagree, whether the public can influence the outcome is an important point to me. Like with my example with the formulation of Tomek’s question (https://manifold.markets/kolotom99/2022-fifa-world-cup-will-irans-nati#EIIgOSzBuziduaMHMrWw), I think with fraud it is close to impossible for the public to influence this outcome. You would have to convince a court that someone is guilty and that is, at least in most countries, very difficult.

Insurances

The difference with life insurances is that the insurer votes YES and has an interest in the well being of the insured person. The only one voting NO is the insured person. And yes, there might be an incentive to kill themselves or for their families to kill them. But the risk of not getting the money because of insurance fraud is a good enough deterrent for me. They could hire a hitman, yes. This is the reason for asking for the value you see in having life or death markets. I think in this case the value of having insurances outweighs the potential risk.

Monopoly money

This was not your argument, but it is an important one to me. This user (https://manifold.markets/BenjaminIkuta/will-prediction-markets-on-individu#xegvefC8TEq4rHRXpAea) argues that assassination markets are not a serious concern for a site that doesn't accept crypto and can only pay out to charity. I don’t want to get into a debate over crypto, so I will not argue that Mana and a crypto currency are pretty similar.

But Mana seems to have value to people. To some people it has enough value to pay for it on this site. I don’t think that it exists at this point, but I can imagine an easy way to pay out Mana for real money. The price of Mana is 1 USD for 100 Mana at the moment.

Here is the scenario: A person with a lot of Mana invites a friend to the site. This friend complains that he does not have a lot of Mana, so the person decides to tip them on posts. His friend is super thankful and gives him some real money. Mana exchanged for real money.

Assassination markets

Since there is a way to cash out, I would argue a life or death market on here is very close to an assassination market.

To me that is a very good argument not to have them on this site. If you don’t agree, my optics take might convince you.

Optics

Optics, the stupidest argument in the world. "It feels bad." is an argument so bad I want to do the opposite of what they want. 

But here is the kicker. I like this site. I want this site to grow. And for that this site can not have the reputation of having assassination markets on it. I might not be able to convince you, Jack, but I think my arguments are pretty convincing to a lot of people.

I think it would be Manifold Market’s best move not to allow life or death markets.

@enemel No. Just no lol

@enemel I've considered most of those counterarguments before and I don't find them very convincing. Also I'm not the only one who believe that these markets should be allowed - I believe the majority of the community does. I'm just replying my own thoughts, but there are many others.

Also, it seems like this discussion should be moved to the discussion market https://manifold.markets/BenjaminIkuta/will-prediction-markets-on-individu. Mind copying your comment there while I write my reply?

@jack copied it. I see most of the community is not on my side, will be an uphill battle.