So.... would you sit at this table.

[SNOWBALL138]

When I play live, I play 3/6. When I play online, I play 1/2. I also play the occasional no limit hold em cash game.
Even playing limits this small, its still likely that I have taken someone's last dollar, but thats not that bad.

When someone has 100 dollars to their name, and loses it, they can make that back in a day or two. When someone has 100k to their name, and you break them, how can they recover from that?

Another thing that you should consider is that gambling is a major source of white collar crime. If we could encourage people to wager responsibly, we could improve america's economy. Not to mention, preventing families from being destroyed.

And no, I don't think its bad to be on the fence about this.

[SNOWBALL138]

Its not bad that you're on the fence about this one. An aggressive, predatory outlook can be helpful for any kind of competition. There's nothing wrong with that outlook. I just think that ignoring the consequences of that outlook can in some situations lead us to do things we wish we hadn't.
I'm not accusing you or anyone else of doing shameful things, but I do think that in the case of taking 90k off of a guy and leaving him totally broke is not something to be happy about.

[coffeecrazy1]

Here's my problem with all of these questions, and no, I'm not going to get into the debate about economics above that I started:

Where do you draw the line? Where do you say that it's okay to take this person's money, but not that person's money? Moreover, what about the other guy's sense of personal responsibility about the money? This question has elicited a lot of responses one way or the other(including my own). I think the thing that bothers me about it is that it is not cause-and-effect; it is perception.

If you play the guy, and he kills himself, that is not a linear progression. Your taking his money did not push him out the window...he jumped. He made a decision that his life was not worth living, and he jumped. That said, I think the backgammon player did the right thing, and the thing I would hope to do in that situation, too.

But, this is very squicky, because it makes it sound as though the other guy does not have a choice, and frankly, I believe strongly enough in people that I believe we always have a choice. I think that I dislike adopting a paternalistic attitude toward other adults, which, incidentally, is why I dislike the current state of government in the United States...but that's a different topic altogether.

[poker-penguin]

[ QUOTE ]

I'll play Devil's Advocate. Sure, you look around you and see a better world than existed in 1600. But, what about all the injustice that occurred throghout those 400 years? We wouldn't be where we are without the suffering and misery of slavery. You wouldn't be able to buy cheap clothing if some 10 year old in Bangladesh wasn't working for 50 cents an hour. If millions of people hadn't died in all the wars over the years, we wouldn't have the political structures available to ensure our current prosperity. Not to mention the fact that sure, perhaps human society has actually advanced, but what about non-human society? What about all the aspects of nature that have been destroyed or forever altered so that we can enjoy SUVs and plastic? I think it's something to think about, anyways.

[/ QUOTE ]

Excellent, playing Devil's Advocate is great (let me know if you want to swap sides). /friendly comment

Do you think there is more or less injustice in the world today than in 1600?

If there is more stuff (which I think you have to accept) and less injustice, then I think we have clear proof that overall, human society is a non-zero sum game (although certain situations, like poker can be treated as such).

Your argument only works if we accept that the non-zero sumness of human society comes at the expense of other species. Some of it certainly does, like idiots with SUVs getting other idiots to allow oil drilling in Alaska.
However, not every improvement in human society has an equally negative impact on the environment.

"The environment" is also very hetrogenous. For example, killing most / all of the wolves in Yellowstone was negative for the wolves, but positive for the elk. Similarly, creating a landfill in a field negatively impacts the rabbits (or whatever) that were living there, but positively impacts the seagulls, rats, and other scavengers. There are many examples of a win for humanity, loss for one species, win for another species situation.

/argument

Seriously, let me know if you want to swap sides.

[hurlyburly]

Man, drunk-girl sex would be the icing on the cake after stripping 100k off that dude.

[Derek in NYC]

[ QUOTE ]
First of all, penguin...do you even know what a zero-sum game is? A zero-sum game is where there is a winner and a loser. I defy you to tell me that the grand majority of life(by life, I don't mean just human beings) is not clearly defined in those terms.

[/ QUOTE ]

This assumption is contrary to classic economics, which assumes that all voluntary transactions are Pareto efficient (i.e., utility maximizing).

In other words, if I pay you $10 to mow my lawn, and you accept and mow my lawn, you value $10 more than the cost/effort it took to mow my lawn, and I value a mowed lawn more than I value $10.

It is a win-win result, not a zero-sum result.

A zero-sum situation would exist if we both were in an airplane and there were only one parachute. Zero sum situations also frequently arise in life. However all of life is not zero-sum.

[nycplayer]

Yes. I'll play until I'm up $99,998 dollars. I'll leave him $2 to buy a bullet, and I'll loan him the gun.

That's poker.

As Robert Heinlein said: "There is no such thing as 'social gambling.' Either you are there to cut the other bloke's heart out and eat it — or you're a sucker. If you don't like this choice — don't gamble."

[hurlyburly]

I can't see how anyone said no. He's got 100k that he can't find a better use for. If it is "all he has to live for", then knocking him down to rock bottom may be the only thing that will awaken his senses.

It's not like he's going to stop shopping around if he gets declined, so saying "no" isn't doing him a favor.

About the only reason I can come up with for saying "no" would be the risk that he wins, because 200k isn't going to fix what's broke with him. I'm positive that losing is what he wants, and he'll just continue searching.

[shutupndeal]

Hey SDM, can I be your Hero too? To me its not even a question. "NO" and no in any terms if the way you put it is that he is ruined and thinking of say Suicide or something, you need to make this kind of a poll 100% clear. I was thinking he has a family, he a degenerate gambler and it will affect his kids and then I thought YES Id play "IF" I knew he would play the next guy and blow it all when I can beat him and drive him home and give it to his Old Lady.

I havent done this playing poker BUT I have done this in some VERY similar ways during my short life span.
I am not going to let someone I know or someone I "feel" for ( to be specific it means means I dont have to know you) throw thier life away and again thats how I took it.
Now I dont believe many of you would do this if you knew it would say bring about his death and again this is how I seen it.

[xniNja]

[ QUOTE ]
Now I dont believe many of you would do this if you knew it would say bring about his death and again this is how I seen it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Think about it this way... if this guy is going to commit suicide if he loses his $100K, yet is still going to try to blow that $100K- he must want to die. However, whether or not he commits suicide if he loses cannot be the issue. We shouldn't just create false scenarios where he may kill himself, and may have a wife and kids to feed or whatever else. Any time you play poker against anybody, for any amount of money, you would then have to take in the same consideration that he's going to kill himself if he loses, or he is losing away money his family needs (which I bet is most often the case anytime anyone is gambling and losing.)

Bottom line: We live in the natural world. The Laws of nature, in the end, govern. I would 100% of the time still sit down at the table if I were guaranteed to win the match. This applies even in the offchance he would kill himself if he loses, or would kill others, or would get a job, or it would bring about a nuclear holocaust.

All that really should concern me, as a poker player, is that he has money that I need, that he either doesn't need or isn't intelligent enough to realize that he needs it; and that alone is enough reason to take it from him.

Life may not exactly be a zero-sum game, but you can bet your last dollar that the next guy will take your food, money, clothes, or life- if it ensures his survival.