JA WestenbergApr 23

A healthy civilisation draws a line around the sacred and refuses to price what's inside it. The line moves, but the line exists.

A civilisation in decay erases that line.

https://www.joanwestenberg.com/why-prediction-markets-are-a-sure-sign-that-our-civilisation-is-in-decay/

Why prediction markets are a sure sign that our civilisation is in decay

Prediction markets are the clearest single sign our civilisation has entered a late and decadent stage. The reason isn't that they're new or sinister. It's that the case for them is defensible, the technology works, the outputs are useful, but the long-term effect is corrosive anyway.

Westenberg.
Show threadOpen Risk

@Daojoan Insightful piece

The idea that every uncertainty can become a market that creates a probability has had some economists drooling but it has been seen in practice in the credit derivatives market that it doesn't work: there is simply not enough interest for most individual company contracts, so they are simply creating a market manipulation mechanism.

Arguably derivative contracts are least bad when there is already a spot market: society has already financialized the underlying good.

Apr 23 at 6:26amWeb