2 Hypothetical "Magic Pill Questions"

[calcbandit]

#1)


Assume a magic pill has the following properties:
-If taken, you will be able to function normally without ever needing sleep, ever.
-Once taken, you will never be able to sleep again.
-You will die earlier. Assuming average age of death of 75, and that 1/3 of time is spent sleeping, this will move the average age of death for a pill taker to about 50.
-Despite this earlier death, assume you will still age normally. You'll just die about when you turn 50.

Would you take this magic pill?

-------------------

#2)

Assume that there is a certain amount of utility one would get from entering into a romantic relationship with another person, and this data existed for every person on earth. Let's call the person who gives you maximum utility your "optimal romantic partner"

There is a 2nd magic pill, which, if taken, increases your chances of ever meeting your optimal romantic partner. Keep in mind your optimal romantic partner could be someone from Hungary, for instance. Note that just 'meeting' your optimal life partner is no guarantee of a relationship, and when the meeting takes place, you will not know that the person is your optimal life partner during the time of the meeting. But, you will at least have time to talk/say something to this person.

The magic pill increases your chances of meeting your optimal life partner by x% some time in the next 5 years. As a side effect, your chance of randomly dying at some point over the next 5 years is doubled. For instance, if there is a 1% chance of me dying in the next 5 years, it is now 2%. It's magic, it just forces this probability to double.

What must x be for you to want to take this pill?

[madnak]

1 - Hell no.

2 - 0.002% or so.

[thirddan]

i would not take either pill...

1. doesn't seem close to me at all
2. much closer, but it seems most likely that you will never actually "meet" your optimal partner, more likely to just be at the same restaurant at the same time or something...unless im misunderstanding the question...

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
2. much closer, but it seems most likely that you will never actually "meet" your optimal partner, more likely to just be at the same restaurant at the same time or something...unless im misunderstanding the question...

[/ QUOTE ]

I figure if she's my optimal mate, I'm going to hit on her. And if I'm her optimal mate, she's going to respond. I mean, if you approach women at all, then you're going to approach your optimal mate, right? Unless the circumstances are really screwed up, but that might still not stop you from at least introducing yourself. And if you don't approach women, then your optimal mate must approach men, right?

[StepBangin]

I wouldnt take either.

Pill #1. What benefit do you get being up from 11pm to 7am when most people are sleeping and there is little to do, and dying 25 years earlier?

[Piers]

No
0

[luckyme]

I think I took half a pill at birth.
I've always slept only 5-6 hours a night.
That gains me about a month or two of waking hours per year vs an 8hr sleepslave. By 50, I'll be up on them 7 - 10 years.

Stay awake constantly? No thanks. The brain needs some downtime to sift out all the blather and froth, in fact I enjoy the 5 minutes or so on each end of sleep where you are a witness to the morphing of reality with unrestricted optional ones.

luckyme, yawnnn

[soon2bepro]

1 - No, but it's close.

2 - 100,000% (that's 1000 times as much, but since the chance is so small anyway...). Put another way, if the pill gives me about 5% total chance or better to find her, I'll take it.

[Dale Dough]

How on earth could pill 1 be beneficial?

It is a reality that part of the world always sleeps 1/3 of the time. At some point, people around you are all bound to be asleep. Even if you travel to curb this effect, you will lose a lot of time travelling.

The things that you can do while others are asleep can also be done while others are awake, except now you have the option to do something with those awake instead. You are in the same spot, except you live later and don't die earlier than friends/loved ones on average.

Also, 25 extra years in the future are probably going to be more interesting than 25 years now while everyone's asleep.

What I might do though is the opposite: Only 8 waking hours per day, but I'll live to be 50% older. I'm lazy about online poker as it is, so I'll sleep when my gf/wife works. Still not sure about that one though; I think you're going to have to kick in some extra benefits such as proportionally more years (100% maybe?), slower aging, maybe a magical ability to always make a lot of money? It would suck to basically have to work twice as hard as everyone else just to get by (I'm assuming poker won't stay the way it is for another 100 years or so here)

[Girchuck]

Lets say that you still go to sleep normally, but while you sleep, the time speeds up for you, so while you subjectively spend 8 hrs asleep, only a few minutes pass in the outside world, is it still worth it?