There seems to be a massive flaw in this logic in that it could be used to justify almost anything.
For example, it would be more important for President Obama to forcibly make a large portion of private industry to work on a super laser to defend against alien invasions, because alien invasions would cause more political fallout than not defending against them.
This is the mental problem with forecasting black-swan events, then basing your strategy on the outsized risk of those events. You can end up justifying insane behavior due to an event you have convinced yourself will happen, even if the odds are infinitesimal.
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There seems to be a massive flaw in this logic in that it could be used to justify almost anything.
For example, it would be more important for President Obama to forcibly make a large portion of private industry to work on a super laser to defend against alien invasions, because alien invasions would cause more political fallout than not defending against them.
This is the mental problem with forecasting black-swan events, then basing your strategy on the outsized risk of those events. You can end up justifying insane behavior due to an event you have convinced yourself will happen, even if the odds are infinitesimal.