> If we evolved to be more rational, then the phenomenon probably wouldn't exist.
I strongly disagree here, I think the phenomenon is in fact part and parcel with the evolution of our rationality. Betting (as you accurately describe) is an intrinsic part of life, and rationality (as I understand) is our evolved response to wrangling that uncertainty. It shouldn't be surprising that the evolutionary reward mechanism for acting rational (big oxytocin hit when you predict something correctly) could get miscalibrated for a subset of the population; that's just biology.
I also think you're making a massive error by conflating criticism of betting with criticism of betting markets, though. Nobody is upset about people dealing with the natural risk of day-to-day life; the problem is that people are now being incentivized to take on additional risk (beyond the day-to-day) which they are poorly equipped to reason about. The systems governing the dynamics of geopolitical events (or other things you can estimate in a betting market) are staggeringly complex, and assigning credences to them is an epistemological nightmare that even the most seasoned experts struggled to do reliably. These market brokers are using a framework of rationalism/"wisdom of the crowds" as a cover to sucker non-expert consumers into what truly is gambling in the sense that you describe it. In principle a person could probably lay accurate odds on a horse race too, but the average punter is never doing that and the same is true of the majority of polymarket users.
I strongly disagree here, I think the phenomenon is in fact part and parcel with the evolution of our rationality. Betting (as you accurately describe) is an intrinsic part of life, and rationality (as I understand) is our evolved response to wrangling that uncertainty. It shouldn't be surprising that the evolutionary reward mechanism for acting rational (big oxytocin hit when you predict something correctly) could get miscalibrated for a subset of the population; that's just biology.
I also think you're making a massive error by conflating criticism of betting with criticism of betting markets, though. Nobody is upset about people dealing with the natural risk of day-to-day life; the problem is that people are now being incentivized to take on additional risk (beyond the day-to-day) which they are poorly equipped to reason about. The systems governing the dynamics of geopolitical events (or other things you can estimate in a betting market) are staggeringly complex, and assigning credences to them is an epistemological nightmare that even the most seasoned experts struggled to do reliably. These market brokers are using a framework of rationalism/"wisdom of the crowds" as a cover to sucker non-expert consumers into what truly is gambling in the sense that you describe it. In principle a person could probably lay accurate odds on a horse race too, but the average punter is never doing that and the same is true of the majority of polymarket users.