Yeah, maybe a bad example on my end.

Still, I just find the idea of turning everything in politics into a casino kind of gross. Taken to the extreme it can get pretty disgusting.

Like, imagine that there were a Polymarket of "Will COVID deaths break 1 million?" or "Will <Insert Serial Killer> Take His Fifth Victim?".

These are hyperbolic examples and I'm not saying that anything on Polymarket is that bad, but even the stuff that's currently on there right now like "Khamenei out as Supreme Leader of Iran by March 31?" [1] or "Israel strikes Iran by February 28, 2026?" [2] seems kind of crass. These are real issues that have real consequences that affect many real humans (who are no less valuable than me) and people are treating this shit like a fucking game.

I'm not accusing you of that, to be clear, it's just why I find Polymarket to be gross and I'm not sure it should be legal.

[1] https://polymarket.com/event/khamenei-out-as-supreme-leader-...

[2] https://polymarket.com/event/israel-strikes-iran-by-february...

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0x3f 21 hours ago | parent [-]

The market already bets on war and death, and has done for probably centuries, only it's mostly institutional players. Seems to me Polymarket just democratizes that, both for bettors and potentially consumers of the probabilities.

I would say the average person is terrible at aggregating media and making predictions, at least this way they can access expert opinion for free.

Of course as yet it's still niche nerd stuff but if I were in Iran, I'd probably find a signal about imminent strikes or future regime change quite useful.

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names_are_hard 18 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I'm in Israel. If you turn on the TV lately, you will inevitably hear a bunch of talking heads endlessly analyzing every word Trump said, and the movement of various US military apparatus, and then sharing "expert" insights into when there's going to be an escalation.

I can't do anything about this, except decide when it's time to pack my go-bag and leave it near the door so I'm ready to go to the bomb shelter in middle of the night. To that end, polymarket odds are helpful. I'd never bet any money myself, of course.

In related news, I read recently that the IDF is currently investigating some personnel who evidently made money predicting the last Israel-Iran flare up using inside information. Naturally this is quite unlawful.

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tombert 20 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I don't like it when governments and military contractors and billionaires gamble with human lives either.

Even if you can derive some utility out of the metrics doesn't mean it's good. One can find silver linings in many illegal things but that doesn't imply that it should be legal.

	▲	0x3f 20 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It's not only those groups though, for example a stable food supply requires an efficient commodities market. The utility is not just marginal.