Predictions of extinction are not like other predictions

February 13, 2025

Predictions of extinction are not like other predictions for at least two reasons: You can’t reason based on track record in the same way you can with normal predictions. The stakes are extremely high. Being wrong on normal predictions rarely matters as much. Why? Regarding point one, reasoning based on track record: Normally, a type of prediction being wrong again and again will lead you to dismiss that type of prediction. For instance, if every year (for some reason), experts...

Many global challenges arise due to collective action problems or incentive misalignment

November 16, 2020

Many of the biggest challenges that we face in society are due to one or both of these types of problems: (A) Collective Action Problems, where many individuals or groups are currently better off taking action X, even though they'd be better off in the long-term if everyone agreed not to take action X. Some of the big challenges with Collective Actions Problems are (i) getting people or groups to agree to stop the behavior in the first place, and then (ii) creating a v...

The three big strategies I see for combating climate change

September 14, 2020

Change my mind: I currently think that there are only three big potential strategies for effectively preventing substantial human-caused climate change in the next 40 years. Climate Strategy 1: Government Collaboration If we collaborated, China, the U.S., India, and Europe could engage in substantial climate emission regulation (e.g., by taxing carbon, using cap-and-trade systems, setting deadlines by which certain industries must be carbon neutral, building cleaner power generation f...

Thinkers Who Say the World Is Insane

August 26, 2020

Some thinkers see that the world is far more insane than is acknowledged, and that our narratives about society, the future, or the self don’t make sense. They develop a theory to explain things. Here’s a list of some of those theories (as I interpret them), explained in extremely concise terms as best as I could manage: The List of Thinkers and Their Core Ideas: 1. Peter Singer We would ruin expensive shoes to save a drowning child we walked by, but not forgo expensive shoes to sav...