Synced with latest draft: Altman line, fisherman gloss, Deutsch flowers, gap in theory.
The Epistemology and Defence of Ambition
Until about a week ago it seemed incredibly obvious to me that wanting to be rich is rational but I could not explain why. Fundamentally I agree with Popper and Deutsch that all life is problem solving. But is not having a mansion on Lake Como a problem? Is not being immortal a problem? How do we decide between these?
The lone scientist obsessed with some theoretical problem strikes most people as weird. How can someone toil for 30 years on a problem, living on a modest salary, without any desire to accumulate massive wealth? According to the simple Popperian view mentioned, that is completely rational. The scientist is fully engrossed in problem solving.
If that is true, why am I and most people so drawn to solving my problem of not having a mansion on Lake Como, driving a Bugatti hypercar, or overlooking the skyline of NYC from a Billionaires' Row apartment? Why am I so drawn to these problems? It can’t just be because they are status symbols. I’d want these things even if nobody knew about them.
I think the two reasons are:
- Wealth is the repertoire of things you can do. I can likely only experience these things with incredible wealth. They are a symbol of that repertoire. Future desires are unknowable thus attaining wealth allows me to solve problems in the future I don’t know I’ll have.
- This is the antithesis to the famous fisherman story. The story contains the assumption that the fisherman already knows the problem he wants to solve. The fisherman might want to travel the world, build a school, research AI, explore space.
- Imagine a person 1000 years ago. They might only want better food, safer shelter, a healthy family, or perhaps a larger farm. But if they knew these things existed, they would desire flying across the Atlantic, playing table tennis, or listening to recorded music.
- There are clear limits to this theory. Just because I’m a septillionaire it does not give me a cure for cancer. The fundamental limitation remains the knowledge.
- Beauty is accumulated knowledge. These experiences—the lake mansion, the hypercar, the best view of the most beautiful skyline humanity has forged—are objects of incredible beauty. They are products of accumulated human knowledge. So desiring beauty is a form of desire to experience knowledge.
So how ambitious should you be? In the startup world there is this famous saying that “Starting a company is always hard and it’s about equally hard no matter what you do.” So why not pick the bigger problem, since if you solve it society will reward you accordingly. Or should you only be guided by curiosity; as that drive likely carries some latent knowledge about what society wants? I don’t know. I suspect it is best to follow a mix of these strategies. Whatever the right mix is, I don't think ambition has a ceiling.
Alexandr Wang recently said “Humans will dream bigger and bigger. Kids will dream of having their own star systems.” I think that is true. And one day kids will dream of owning several galaxies. We don't yet know what we'd want after that. Human dreams, desire, and our future are infinite.
The Epistemology and Defence of Ambition
Until about a week ago it seemed incredibly obvious to me that wanting to be rich is rational but I could not explain why. Fundamentally I agree with Popper and Deutsch that all life is problem solving. But is not having a mansion on Lake Como a problem? Is not being immortal a problem? How do we decide between these?
The lone scientist obsessed with some theoretical problem strikes most people as weird. How can someone toil for 30 years on a problem, living on a modest salary, without any desire to accumulate massive wealth? According to the Popperian view above, that is completely rational. The scientist is fully engrossed in problem solving.
If that is true, why am I and most people so drawn to solving my problem of not having a mansion on Lake Como, driving a Bugatti hypercar, or overlooking the skyline of NYC from a Billionaires’ Row apartment? Status plays a part, but I think I’d want these things even if nobody knew about them.
I think the two reasons are:
- Wealth is the repertoire of things you can do. I can likely only experience these things with incredible wealth. They are a symbol of that repertoire. Some of my desires I know already, like the mansion. Most I don’t know yet. Future desires are unknowable, thus attaining wealth allows me to solve problems in the future I don’t know I’ll have.
- This is the antithesis to the famous fisherman story (a businessman advises a fisherman to scale up his business so he can retire and fish). The story contains the assumption that the fisherman already knows the problem he wants to solve. The fisherman might want to travel the world, build a school, research AI, explore space.
- Imagine a person 1000 years ago. They might only want better food, safer shelter, a healthy family, or perhaps a larger farm. But if they knew these things existed, they would desire flying across the Atlantic, playing table tennis, or listening to recorded music.
- There are clear limits to this theory. Just because I’m a septillionaire doesn’t mean I get a cure for cancer. The fundamental limitation remains the knowledge.
- Beauty is accumulated knowledge. These experiences—the lake mansion, the hypercar, the best view of the most beautiful skyline humanity has forged—are objects of incredible beauty. They are products of accumulated human knowledge. So desiring beauty is a form of desire to experience knowledge. Deutsch’s example is flowers: they evolved to attract insects, yet we find them beautiful too.
So how ambitious should you be? In the startup world there is this famous saying that “Starting a company is always hard and it’s about equally hard no matter what you do.” So why not solve the problem people pay the most for? Or should you only be guided by curiosity, as that drive likely carries some latent knowledge about what society wants or where the most interesting gaps are? I don’t know. This is a gap in my theory, and I’d love for someone to fill it. I suspect it is best to follow a mix of these strategies. Whatever the right mix is, I don’t think ambition has a ceiling.
Alexandr Wang recently said “Humans will dream bigger and bigger. Kids will dream of having their own star systems.” I think that is true. And one day kids will dream of owning several galaxies. We don’t yet know what we’d want after that. Human dreams, desire, and our future are infinite.