[extropy-chat] Re: Robin Hanson on Cynicism

[Robin Hanson]

At 10:16 AM 9/23/2005, Brett Paatsch  wrote:
>>>>...  And the situation is much worse on topics where there are 
>>>>certain positions that ordinary people typically *want* to 
>>>>believe (such as the health effectiveness of medicine).
>>>
>>>You have grounds for thinking ordinary people are mistaken
>>>as to the health effectiveness of medicine?
>>I know that you responded to a thread in the last month which started
>>from my posting this link: http://hanson.gmu.edu/feardie.pdf,
>>wherein I outline my grounds for so thinking.
>
>In your essay you say
>
>"fear of death makes us spend  15% of our income on medicine from
>which we get little or no health benefit, while we neglect things like
>exercise which offer large health benefits".
>
>But I can't see where you answer the basic question what does Robin
>mean by medicine? You seem to assume that *everyone* just knows
>what medicine is. I think that is not a valid assumption. Your essay
>surveys work done by others but it is not clear that *they* have defined
>  medicine the same way as you or indeed as each other.

You baffle me.  The usual intuitive definition of medicine is "the stuff
that doctors do".  You know going to them to get advice, some of which is
to take drugs, undergo surgery, and so on.  The RAND experiment operationalized
that in the obvious way - they gave folks money to go to the doctor more.

>At one point you say "eight (note NOT 80 but just 8) percent

That is a typo (now fixed).  The figure is eighty percent.

>I'm obviously missing something here Robin.  I can't see any real substance
>in the essay. To me you just don't cut down to anything substantive.

I find it hard to imagine what would count as substance to you.



Robin Hanson  rhanson at gmu.edu  http://hanson.gmu.edu
Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University
MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444
703-993-2326  FAX: 703-993-2323