Board 8 > Would you rather know...

(+) Yeah! (+)

This is pretty hard. I think I'd probably choose >10k mainly because the second option would make interactions with people pretty awkward. Being able to know all the details of someone's private life would make things a lot easier if you're looking to manipulate someone, but probably a lot harder if you're trying to bond with that person.

And while I could always just not use the power, that's what I tell myself every time I discover some overpowered strategy in a game. So I know exactly how that would go.

Knowing every secret makes you a target for every spy agency foreign and domestic. You will be black bagged and disappear without a trace. Your family will probably never learn what happened to you.

All the common knowledge means all of the languages, how to survive almost anywhere, how to do any job. You would have access to any life you'd wish to live.

ChichiriMuyo posted...

You will be black bagged and disappear without a trace

you would be able to know if anybody wanted to

hombad46 posted...

I don't think you're understanding it right. We're not picking 10,000 people and getting all the knowledge they have, we're getting all the facts in the world that are known by at least 10,000 people

Ah, I get it now. That makes sense.

NFUN posted...

you would be able to know if anybody wanted to

Yeah, you could theoretically have Batman levels of preparedness to stay one step ahead of your pursuers, but that's easier said than done.

Great question

I'd choose happiness over wealth/power, which I think lends itself to option A

I went with the first option finally. Too much trouble worrying about all the risks of the second one, I'd just like to keep things simple. First one can already lead to a ton of amazing things. Second one can make you rich but idk, I'm happy to work as a universal translator, that probably would pay well. Or there's likely some other ways I'm not realizing.

ChichiriMuyo posted...

Knowing every secret makes you a target for every spy agency foreign and domestic. You will be black bagged and disappear without a trace. Your family will probably never learn what happened to you.

why would anyone know you had the power?

First option is safer and consistent, and could improve your life in pretty obvious ways even if you chose to only use a small portion of your knowledge (of course you could still go bigger if you wanted to).

Second option is more risky and volatile, and could easily have huge significant effects both positive and negative depending on what you learned and what you did with it.

The question is, how adventurous do you want to be with your power? (I choose the first one, I don't want to do anything crazy, I just want to better myself)

NFUN posted...

you would be able to know if anybody wanted to

Yeah, you would know, but how would you stop them? If the CIA wanted to disappear you even if you knew, you aren't getting out of it. TSA or boarder patrol will detain you if you try to leave the country. If you get onto any communication network the NSA will track you. The FBI will investigate anyone that might offer you help. Every time you dodge them with your knowledge you have fewer options of escape until eventually they will get you.

banananor posted...

why would anyone know you had the power?

If you use it to almost any extent some agency will eventually pick up on you. Unless you are satisfied just knowing and never telling anyone and never trying to profit and never helping anyone that needs it, you will eventually start to stick out like a sore thumb. You'd have to know all the secrets in the world and ignore almost all of them. Most people have a hard time keeping relatively mundane secrets to themselves... to not make yourself a person of interest you will have to keep thousands of murders and rapes to yourself every year, and that's just the start. You'd have to be a primary knowledge holder of all of those terrible crimes, but let's say none of that weighs on your conscious... You still can't use you secrets to make too much money. Governments tend to be much better at tracking financial anomalies than violent crimes. They'll track your investments, they'll even develop predictive algorithms to know when you're losing money on purpose.

There is no real way to use this knowledge without it blowing up in your face, at least over a long enough period of time. And there will be so much terrible knowledge that even the coldest of hearts will feel bad about doing nothing. And what if the secret you know is that the place you live will be subject to a WMD, do you flee and let thousands or millions of people die, or do you tell someone that can help what you know and... you're black bagged.

Realistically you either don't use the knowledge, and constantly have live with all of the worst parts of humanity while having little or no added power to help yourself... or you use the knowledge to help yourself or others and eventually someone looks into everything you have done and decides you are psychic or made an advanced AI or whatever. Whatever it is, it's going top be something the alphabet agencies will not just let go of.

You also know how to get around those traps if those ways exist.

And theoretically you know people who could and would be willing to help you if you want to find allies. You would also know who on the inside you could turn to your side to help you.

Not saying it would be easy but you do possess the knowledge to pull it off if possible.

Actually, under 10k has one thing beyond everything that is known by numbers of 1, which is more interesting and dangerous than anything. Every single name/password in the world.