Report back on how it goes

1. Is the existence of the Guinness Book of World Records a positive or a negative for humanity on net? 2. Bragging about material possessions is low-status in much of the West, forcing people to jostle through subtle wealth cues (travel, education, hobbies, food). But then why isn’t there another...

subterfuge, berries, Bayes, billboards, stop signs

Some time ago, I was driving somewhere with a friend and I claimed that someone was operating with subterfuge. There was an odd silence, after which my friend quietly asked, 'What was that?' Something was wrong. Was she offended? I said, '...subterfuge?' She gave me a brief and somewhat pitying...

More of them

That when cyanobacteria arose 2 billion years ago and filled the atmosphere with oxygen which killed off most species and removed methane from the air so temperatures crashed and the entire planet was encased in ice, this didn’t quite extinguish all life but eventually led to the rise of eukaryotes...

We believe stuff because it benefits us to believe it, not necessarily because it is true.

We believe stuff because it benefits us to believe it, not necessarily because it is true. Phrased that way, it seems like an obvious point—of course evolution made us like that, what else could it have done? But this has surprising explanatory power.

A debate about humanity's ultimate adversary

Evil. The problem is people doing bad things that they know are bad. Everyone just needs to stop demanding bribes and littering and murdering each other. Moral confusion. No, in reality, most people try to do the right thing most of the time. The problem is that our idea of...

The puzzling movement reduce diagnostic tests because of harmful downstream treatments

1. Say we’re detectives. We’re getting a drink and have the following conversation: Me: Ah, this case is killing me. You: Then why don’t you go talk to Big Eddie? Me: Nah—that would do more harm than good. You: How’s that? Me: Well, we all know Big Eddie often lies....

Dark patterns in social behavior

I was working in a cafe when a woman sat nearby and asked me if there was anywhere in the neighborhood she could see some art. Hoping to get back to work, I made a couple of suggestions. She asked many follow-up questions. Where were these places? Did I like...

Do we really know what the future needs?

The argument for long-term thinking goes something like this: ● There are X people alive today. ● In the future, there will be Y≫X people alive. ● All people have equal moral weight. ● Therefore the state of the world in the future is more important than the state of...

Here are some things that I hated as a student. At the time, I thought my teachers didn't understand or care how terrible they were.

In a recent post, Parrhesia suggested that course grades should be 100% determined by performance on a final exam—an exam that could be taken repeatedly, with the last attempt being the course grade. (See also the discussion at r/slatestarcodex.) The idea is that grades are supposed to measure what you...

When does talking about a plan ruin it? Marriage, CO2, religion, self-promotion, edgelords, and Chinese medicine.

You're in love. The two of you want to share the rest of your lives. So, being good game theorists, you have a romantic dinner and plan how to align your interests for mutually beneficial optimal strategic behavior. Your goals are (1) to Odysseus yourself so that even if you're...

30 underrated reasons to be thankful, starting with the fact that atomic bombs don't ignite the atmosphere

That our atmosphere has low enough pressure and levels of deuterium that nuclear fission in air doesn’t cause hydrogen atoms to fuse into helium, meaning that the first nuclear bomb test in 1945 didn’t in fact ignite the atmosphere and engulf the planet in flames, which was still a bit...