[RD] Why do you still have two kidneys?

Seems like a good place to put a rather generic link:

https://www.kidney.org/transplantation/livingdonors/what-expect-after-donation

Just because most people have okay function after donation, doesn't mean that all people will. This is something that affects not only your life, but the life of any dependents or codependents that you have. Notably, that page does highlight various psychological outcomes which should not be underestimated, discarded, or minimised in any way.

This is aside from the generally-increased risk of high blood pressure, which definitely isn't fun especially if it runs in the family (diet aside). The impact on sports is not to be discounted; it's not a selfish thing when sports can be used for both mental health and physical fitness (which links back to mental health). For example, I play water polo. I most probably wouldn't, given that I have a family, if I went through this donation.

I'm not personally opposed either, but there are valid reasons that shouldn't be discounted just because it's not a 50% or greater chance of the donor dying or living some kind of helllife. Which is the impression I've gotten from reading, at least so far.

(I'm getting used to Off Topic, but I think I like it here)
 
Mouthwash said:
Taking a tiny risk to do tremendous good is not putting strangers ahead of your family.
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Your statement is false for manual laborers who are primary breadwinners. The converse, however, is always consistent. Avoiding a costly (depending on location, possibly paid by the donor) procedure with certainty for at least slightly diminished health and small probability of seriously diminished health or death is putting his family ahead of strangers.

The thing about Good and Evil is that they are usually tied to dogmatic moral systems. Conservative Catholics say abortion is always evil and Radical Feminists say denying abortion is always evil. In my set of morals, bullying is evil, which includes harassing people for disagreeing with virtue signaling, unwanted proselytizing, and flame baiting.
 
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It cost about $1,000 to save a stranger's life. I would put the kidney donation as much more costly than that. Its upside is that the benefit is directly observable. So it cost more, but you see the benefit more directly
 
I have two kidneys. But does someone have one to spare so that I can have three?
 
https://www.businessinsider.com/the...ve-a-life-for-333706-and-thats-a-steal-2015-7

GiveWell calculates it at about $3500 per statistical life saved by battling malaria.

I should have said $5k in order to set expectations. I was thinking in orders of magnitude. I think there are many people who'd not sell a kidney for $100k, but would seriously consider it at $1 million.

Compared to that, $5k is very little. Many people could donate that about every ten years. Faster, if people dedicated the whole 2% of their average charity budget in that direction.
 
El_Machinae said:
It cost about $1,000 to save a stranger's life. I would put the kidney donation as much more costly than that. Its upside is that the benefit is directly observable. So it cost more, but you see the benefit more directly
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I think that being so far removed from the results of your donation is corrupting. Give a kidney and you know that's going in someone who would otherwise not get one. Giving an organization money is suspect, far more so if it is a 'statistical' life you are saving.
 
Saying "it's corrupting" is a great way to justify spending $5k on yourself, instead.

The world is only going to improve if people are willing to work to make it better. After that, it's a function of efficiency.

If my kidney donation drops my income or increases my expenses, then I would have to trim charity donations. After that, it's just numbers. $500 annually saves a life every ten years. I've more than seven years left.
 
People should work to benefit their communities and neighboring ones. It's true that your money can go farther in Tanzania than in Vermont, but it can also cause more harm. That's what proponents of effective altruism don't comprehend.
 
What is the value of the proximity? Is it just that you have an easier time tracking the cost-benefit ratio? Or is it because it is morally superior to help your neighbor than the stranger?



The value of a statistical life should not be underestimated. In the opening post, you created a fairly one to one thought experiment. But all of the underlying technology that allows your one-to-one thought experiment was generated through people donating towards the concept of the statistical life. The technology would not have existed if individual people limited their desire to help to directly observable effects
 
El_Machinae said:
What is the value of the proximity? Is it just that you have an easier time tracking the cost-benefit ratio? Or is it because it is morally superior to help your neighbor than the stranger?
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Mostly the former. Taking action in foreign countries is always a bad idea. Even actions that manifestly produce benefits eventually get twisted and milked.

Most human knowledge is personal and communal. Absent that, liars rush in to fill the void.

The value of a statistical life should not be underestimated. In the opening post, you created a fairly one to one thought experiment. But all of the underlying technology that allows your one-to-one thought experiment was generated through people donating towards the concept of the statistical life. The technology would not have existed if individual people limited their desire to help to directly observable effects.
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It is not possible to reliably predict technological advancement (even less to predict how beneficial funding will be, at least for the casual observer), so your analogy kind of reinforces my point.
 
El_Machinae said:
remember there are people like commodore that are completely unwilling to help other people.
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There are some Iraqi citizens out there that would disagree with this statement about me.

The thing is though, I was a soldier then. In that role, it was expected of me to put myself in harm's way to protect strangers and I accepted that role. I'm not a soldier anymore though. I'm just a regular, everyday nobody and the only obligation an everyday nobody has is to take care of themselves and their families.
 
Zelig said:
This seems like a conclusion absent an argument.
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Aside from US foreign policy debacles, mild investigation of even 'human rights' organizations will demonstrate just how partisan and corrupt they are.
 
I'm not really worried about that, at least for myself.
 
I still have two kidneys because despite multiple crafty attempts, my constant vigilance and superior ninja skills have prevented my enemies from stealing one
 
Is there even a system in place for living people to just randomly donate kidneys to some sort of central kidney bank?
 
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