Were I a billionaire with aspirations to be an Iron Man-like superhero, wouldn’t it be rather “boring” to have to set up front companies to dig the tunnels to my secret underground lair?
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Replying to @Grady_Booch
Underground drilling is all the rage with billionaires https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/20/amazons-jeff-bezos-is-building-a-giant-clock-inside-a-texas-mountain.html …
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Replying to @mik3caprio @Grady_Booch
Thinking very far ahead into the future seems to be correlated with becoming a Billionaire.
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Replying to @Plinz @Grady_Booch
It's the "Ozymandias Effect". When you're effectively infinitely wealthy, the only thing left to accumulate is status, so you put your name on buildings, monuments, foundations, anything else that can survive you. It's not thinking about the future, more like peeing on history.
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Replying to @mik3caprio @Grady_Booch
Sure, Bill Gates has nothing left to do but "pee on history" by abolishing polio, and Soros "pees on history" by changing political landscapes. But Elon Musk specifically acquired his wealth as part of his attempts to save humanity, and Bezos did so by outthinking retailers.
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Replying to @Plinz @Grady_Booch
Truly altruistic people aren't concerned with putting their name on things or care about what history will think of them. And it's never a good idea to worship people from afar, no matter how much money they've gathered. You may want to look deeper into their real histories.
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Replying to @mik3caprio @Grady_Booch
Conversely, it is quite easy to feel disdain for people from afar, especially if they have almost no financial limitations. Since most of our constraints appear to be financial, it is difficult to imagine how to have the same values yet entirely different operators.
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Replying to @Plinz @Grady_Booch
It is also pretty easy to not place businesspersons on pedestals they don't particularly deserve to be on. Calling Elon Musk the savior of humanity is really quite a bit over the top.
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Replying to @mik3caprio @Grady_Booch
I did not call him that. I just suspect that a large part of his motivation is the attempt to deal with existential risks.
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Replying to @Plinz @Grady_Booch
You did write he's working to save humanity. That means you're calling him a savior of humanity, I'm not sure why you think there's a difference. I don't purport to know his actual mind, but he is clearly a businessperson and surely shares the motivations of businesspeople.
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I work to find truth, but that does not make me The Finder of Truth. But if you want to influence the world, you need to build organizations and acquire assets, which usually means engaging in business, no?
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Replying to @Plinz @Grady_Booch
Thanks for the conversation Joscha, I think I've reached the end of it.
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Replying to @mik3caprio @Grady_Booch
Sorry to hear that! Thank you likewise.
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