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Comment by maxerickson | Hacker News Reader

Of course people smoke where it doesn't make much sense.

I mean, think about it for a second.

My friend's explanation was that if the really flammable stuff gets out, it's already going to be on fire anyway. He described a technician tossing his cigar butt in a puddle of diesel fuel to make the point. The fuel didn't catch fire.

Diesel isn't particularly volatile, it's difficult to ignite even with an open flame. Nothing like gasoline/petrol (which also would probably pass his cigar butt test, but vapors from which could certainly ignite from the match he used to light his cigar.)

I thought about it and couldn't figure out why it's obvious. Care to share some light on that?

Refineries are flammable. Cigarettes burn intentionally.

Not saying it’s the best joke, just explaining the meaning.

Not the OP. Two thoughts: Working in an environment that could explode at any minute requires some relief to combat stress. Kind of like a war zone. OR Smoking doesn't make sense, so of course people who choose to smoke would do so where it doesn't make sense.

Smoking a cigarette has its downsides no matter how flammable the greater surrounding environment happens to be.

So in your world, if you’re willing to be X amount self-destructive or accept X risk, you’re also willing to accept X + Y risk or self destruction regardless of how large Y is. Got it.

No, I just expect that acceptance of X is correlated with acceptance of Y.

(and really, much of the time, acceptance is the wrong word. Indifference or something like that often fits better)

Which also doesn't hold. I'm willing to invest my money, but I'm not sticking it into penny stocks. Your reasoning ignores any sort of reasonable boundary people have wrt risk.

That's not what correlated means.

You're right. Correlated does not mean "people who have historically take risks will take any risk regardless of the danger."

Which shouldn't have quote because it wasn't what I said, and isn't even a fair reading of what I said.

Correlated implies a statistical relationship, ruling out phrases like "will take any risk regardless" and requiring phrases more like "may tend to" and such.

And then I even said that I "expect" the correlation, so it's probably reasonable to read the usage as more conversational than scientific.

It's pretty typical addict behavior. Next time you go to a gas station, look at the ground. Unless they sweep regularly, the ground next to the pumps will have a great deal of cigarette butts on it.

Smoke doesn’t belong in your lungs.

They are saying it doesn't make any sense for anyone to smoke anywhere.

ITT, people love their nic-o-tine.

No, it's only that this isn't Reddit and you have to try a bit harder to bring people over to your way of thinking.

No, people just have an issue with the pretentious way you're making your case.

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