How much do you value your life?
 

This thought came to me yesterday:

If you had to pick one ticket from a bin of 100 tickets, where 99 of the tickets is a certian amount of money, and one ticket is immediate death (think giant Miller Lite can falling on your head), how much money would the 99 money tickets need to be worth each?

I know my answer, I am curious about you all, if you would take that bet at all, and if you did, how much would you need to stand to gain?

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

3 mill.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

Assuming that my life insurance would pay off my heirs if I suffer a bad beat, then I would say $10 million ($7 million if tax-free).

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

Depends on whether you are religious or not. If you see death as infinitely negative value (by that I mean going to hell, or similar), then you'd need the other tickets to be of infinite value to you to be neutral EV. If you see death as the cessation of life (if you are atheist, or just believe that when you die you cease to be concious), then any positive amount of money at all would be +ev (as the value of death is 0).

Personally, I'd take it for any amount of money greater than I could make in the time it takes me to pick a ticket.

What if ....
 

How about turning it around. the tickets with the money each say 1 Billion dollars. There is one death ticket.

How many tickets do there need to be in the bin before you'd play this game? More than 2?

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

Spiritually speaking, I would not take this bet. My life is not mine to gamble with. There is a reason I am having these experiences at this point in time. I may not always have perfect perception of the reason, but there is one.

Practically speaking, I still would not take this bet. Money is an infinitely renewable resource. My life is not. I am not willing to risk the opportunity cost of not getting to live anymore.

Also under the "my life is not mine to gamble with" category: I would never risk causing such grief to Gilbert, my parents, my brother, my grandmother, my best friends, and a whole lot of other people who care about me. They would be devastated enough if I died...I would never risk them knowing that I bet my life on the pull of a ticket, trying to get rich quick. That is just selfish.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

This seems as backwards as you can possibly get. If you're religious, chances are you believe you're going to a "good" afterlife, therefore death is just the end of a small fraction of your total consciousness. If you're an atheist, death is the end of 100% of your future.

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Personally, I'd take it for any amount of money greater than I could make in the time it takes me to pick a ticket.

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Even if we assume the rest of your life has no value to you other than the amount of money you would make, unless you are on your deathbed this doesn't make much sense.

As an example, let's say that you would live for 5 more years if you didn't draw a ticket. Your winrate is $60/hr (the exact amount doesn't matter, I'm just making an example). It probably takes two minutes to choose a ticket, which means theoretically you would take this bet if the payoff was $3.

So, 99% of the time, you make an extra $3 over the course of your life. The other 1%, you lose all the income you would have made for the rest of your life, which if that amount is more than $2.97 makes this a -EV gamble even from a pure monetary standpoint.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I was assuming it would be an instant death; if it would be, and when you die you cease to be concious instantly, then it would make no difference, as you'd only be aware when you win. This is all assuming you are a "hardcore" atheist with no doubts about it.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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I was assuming it would be an instant death; if it would be, and when you die you cease to be concious instantly, then it would make no difference, as you'd only be aware when you win. This is all assuming you are a "hardcore" atheist with no doubts about it.

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I disagree with that completely. I am a "hardcore" atheist and have been for over a decade. It's my view that since this is the only life I have then I'd like to live as much of it as possible.

That said I don't think I'd take the ticket for any amount. I already have more money then I'll ever need and I can't see risking death just for a few million more.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

$2 a ticket.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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Personally, I'd take it for any amount of money greater than I could make in the time it takes me to pick a ticket.

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Re: How much do you value your life?
 

The ammount is not as important to me as the probability.

I would take the bet if the odds of dying were 1000 to 1. And the payoff was like 5 million.

Why? Because I sometimes assume risks of 1000 to 1 of dying without having a payoff at all (example: trying to cross a busy multi-lane street outside the pedestrian zone by running fast) or I guess some extreme sports like mountain climbing or bouldering could have the same odds of dying.

100 to 1 would require billions, and even then, I don't know if i'd take it.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

then again.. i dont know if id take 1000 to 1 as well.

sometimes the longshot comes through :/
like when I won the billion hand at Pokerstars, i calculated my odds were well under 1 to 4000 and i hit.

good question though

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when you die you cease to be concious instantly, then it would make no difference, as you'd only be aware when you win.

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I think it's better if you have a second or two to let the information sink in; you can get out one last "F**k me!" before you go, like when Wile E. Coyote realizes he no longer has cliff underneath him.

I go with $500K.

Re: What if ....
 

I play this game with 20 tickets.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I don't play...life is the big money ticket. I'm scared shitless of death.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I would do it if the winning ticket was $30,000,000. On 30 mil, I can live the rest of my life very comfortably.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

Not sure if there's any amount of money I would do this for. Being an atheist, I know there will be nothing when I do. I'd much rather be alive with no money than dead. Plus I'm still young and have the best years of my life to go through. My answer might change if I was 45 with a old, fat wife and kids asking for college money.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

4 million dollars.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

1 Billion. There's a lot of stuff I want. I think a 1% chance of dying is worth it to be able to have it. I have other ways to try and make a million dollars or more without riking my life, but for a billion, I think I'd take it.

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I don't value my life highly at all. Umm..I'd roll a 20 sided die for $100k where 19 sides are the $$ and 1 is death.

Speaking of that miller commercial that one with the pizza grease is hilarious.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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I was assuming it would be an instant death; if it would be, and when you die you cease to be concious instantly, then it would make no difference, as you'd only be aware when you win. This is all assuming you are a "hardcore" atheist with no doubts about it.

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So, if you kill me in my sleep, you haven't harmed me because I won't know you did it? Sorry, not buying it.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

It would have to be infiniti dollars. In other words, im not taking this gamble.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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Not sure if there's any amount of money I would do this for. Being an atheist, I know there will be nothing when I do. I'd much rather be alive with no money than dead. Plus I'm still young and have the best years of my life to go through. My answer might change if I was 45 with a old, fat wife and kids asking for college money.

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You have a lot to learn about life. My wife and kid are the reason I'd never ever do this for any amount of money.

Marlow

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I'm an atheist, and I want to live as long as possible, because I enjoy life and don't want to give it up until I absolutely have to (unless it becomes unbearable for some reason). That said, if there were 50,000+ tickets (with only one death ticket), and the value were sufficient to set me and my family up for life (probably in excess of $10M), and my life insurance would take care of my wife for the rest of her life, I'd probably take it.

This reminds me of a short story I read a while back, the name and author of which escape me, in which the premise was that everyone "paid" for everything by sticking their hand into a device. The device was set up to deliver an instantly fatal injection some extremely small percentage of the time (the main problem facing the country - not sure if it was set in the US - was overpopulation). A visitor was interviewing a father, who proudly "paid" for his family's visit to an amusement park, considering it his duty to assume the risk. The story ended with the mother hysterically carrying their two dead children back to him, after they'd snuck off and "paid" for their own ride.

An interesting hypothetical, and as I think about that story, I'm not sure I'd take the bet after all. Ah, well; I'm a chicken.... [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

-Mike

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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This thought came to me yesterday:

If you had to pick one ticket from a bin of 100 tickets, where 99 of the tickets is a certian amount of money, and one ticket is immediate death (think giant Miller Lite can falling on your head), how much money would the 99 money tickets need to be worth each?

I know my answer, I am curious about you all, if you would take that bet at all, and if you did, how much would you need to stand to gain?

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Money means nothing. I would not take this bet.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I'm really surprised with how many people responded "any amount of money more then I can make in the time it takes to grab the ticket". If there being serious and not just putting on some internet bravado, then I wonder why they put so little value on their lives.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I would do it once for 400k.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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I would say $10 million ($7 million if tax-free).

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The tax on 10mil is way more than 3 mil.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I think it depends on your situation. There have been times in my life where I'd have pulled a ticket for a Big Mac and a pack of smokes...

Now?

At least a Big Mac meal... supersize, and a carton of cigarettes.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

so, I set the price at 4 million each (since I couldn't bear the people I would attract should I come into much more money than that) and I WON!

Then while celebrating in the street I was hit by a truck and killed.

As I'm floating on up into the sky I realized that this is a good bet to take for even less money because I was never guaranteed to keep on living past today anyway. [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

reminds me of another short Story.

'The Lottery' by Shirley Jackson.

Great story...

As for the OP:

I think I would take 10 million for the same odds as it would be to skydive or scuba dive.

-Gryph

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

how much would you guys have to get paid to try a foot long putt for your life? 2 foot? 3 foot?

what wishes would have to be granted to try a 6 foot, 10 foot, 50 foot putt for your life? (think altruistically)

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

make it a cool million and I'd gamble. I figure if i cant win a 100-1 shot, i dont deserve to live.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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Not sure if there's any amount of money I would do this for. Being an atheist, I know there will be nothing when I do. I'd much rather be alive with no money than dead. Plus I'm still young and have the best years of my life to go through. My answer might change if I was 45 with a old, fat wife and kids asking for college money.

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You have a lot to learn about life. My wife and kid are the reason I'd never ever do this for any amount of money.

Marlow

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Now what would your wife say if she saw you calling her old and fat?

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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Also under the "my life is not mine to gamble with" category: I would never risk causing such grief to Gilbert, my parents, my brother, my grandmother, my best friends, and a whole lot of other people who care about me.

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Godfried??

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

I wouldnt do it for less than like 5 million.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

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Not sure if there's any amount of money I would do this for. Being an atheist, I know there will be nothing when I do. I'd much rather be alive with no money than dead. Plus I'm still young and have the best years of my life to go through. My answer might change if I was 45 with a old, fat wife and kids asking for college money.

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You have a lot to learn about life. My wife and kid are the reason I'd never ever do this for any amount of money.

Marlow

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Do you drive a car? Do you eat food that you haven't prepared yourself? Hell, do you leave the house? If so, you take chances every day that jeopardize your life and therefore the well being of your wife and kids.

Why is it that whenever someone puts this in terms of a wager, people get self-righteous about how they wouldn't risk their lives for any amount of money?

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

One point you're missing; I can decline this raffle and still have a fully functioning life. If we try to eliminate all risks, WE CANNOT LIVE.

Too many people in this thread (especially the people who would apparently do it for $3 if the raffle takes less than two minutes) seem to be missing the fact that it's not how the bet stands on its own individual merits rather than how it compares to the action of not taking a bet. Kind of like people who in a poker hand, view one line of action, then rather than compare its EV to every possible play, they just compare it to zero and say "It's +EV and therefore correct," which is false. In this case, you can take N life-threatening risks, or N+1 life-threatening risks, and the point being made is that poster doesn't want to take any extraneous risks.

Re: How much do you value your life?
 

What defines an extraneous risk? Should I only drive to work and back everyday? Should I stop driving to the pool hall, just because I could die in an accident? I don't need to play pool to survive.