More on "multiple world-size economies per atom" var siteUrl = 'https://www.cold-takes.com'; var localTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\_theme'); switch (localTheme) { case 'dark': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-dark'); break; case 'light': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-light'); break; default: break; } { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Article", "publisher": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "Cold Takes", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/favicon.ico", "width": 48, "height": 48 } }, "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Holden Karnofsky", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/07/HK-headshot-current---compressed-1.jpg", "width": 1600, "height": 1067 }, "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/author/holden/", "sameAs": [ "https://www.cold-takes.com/about/" ] }, "headline": "More on "multiple world-size economies per atom"", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/more-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom/", "datePublished": "2021-08-27T18:07:27.000Z", "dateModified": "2021-08-28T09:04:01.000Z", "description": "A follow up on "This Can't Go On" for the skeptical.", "mainEntityOfPage": { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://www.cold-takes.com/" } } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content, .gh-post-upgrade-cta { display: flex; flex-direction: column; align-items: center; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Roboto, Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; text-align: center; width: 100%; color: #ffffff; font-size: 16px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content { border-radius: 8px; padding: 40px 4vw; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta h2 { color: #ffffff; font-size: 28px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; margin: 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta p { margin: 20px 0 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta small { font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a { color: #ffffff; cursor: pointer; font-weight: 500; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a:hover { color: #ffffff; opacity: 0.8; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn { display: block; background: #ffffff; text-decoration: none; margin: 28px 0 0; padding: 8px 18px; border-radius: 4px; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn:hover { opacity: 0.92; } .shaded-table { color: #000000; border: 1px solid; vertical-align: top; } .shaded-table a { color: #0000dd; } .sticky-subscribe-div { z-index: 1000; position: fixed; bottom: 25px; right: 25px; max-width: 500px; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1; } .sticky-subscribe-button { cursor: pointer; padding: 20px; background: var(--brand-color); color: var(--white-color); border-radius: 50px; border-style: none; } .subscribe-overlay { position: fixed; top: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0; left: 0; z-index: 2000; display: flex; justify-content: center; align-items: center; background: var(--white-color); opacity: 0; transition: opacity 0.3s ease-in; pointer-events: none; } .subscribe-overlay:target { z-index: 2001; opacity: 0.95; pointer-events: auto; } .subscribe-form { margin: 1.5em 0; padding: 6.5vh 7vw 8vh; border-style: solid !important; border: var(--mid-gray-color); border-radius: 10px; text-align: center; } .subscribe-overlay-title { display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 10px 0; font-size: 3rem; line-height: 1.15em; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-overlay-description { margin: 0 auto 50px; max-width: 500px; color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 2rem; line-height: 1.3em; opacity: 0.8; } .subscribe-form .form-group { align-self: stretch; display: flex; } .subscribe-email { padding: 10px; border: 1px solid; border-color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 1.8rem; line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; user-select: text; transition: border-color 0.15s linear; -webkit-appearance: none; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { word-break: normal; position: relative; display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 0 10px; padding: 0 20px; height: 43px; outline: none; font-size: 1.5rem; line-height: 39px; font-weight: 400; background: var(--brand-color); border-radius: 5px; color: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .button-loader, .subscribe-form .message-success, .subscribe-form .message-error { display: none; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-content { visibility: hidden; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-loader { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 50%; display: inline-block; margin-left: -19px; transform: scale(0.7); } .subscribe-overlay .loading .button-loader { top: 5px; } .subscribe-form .button-loader svg path, .subscribe-form .button-loader svg rect { fill: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .success .message-success, .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; margin: 1em auto 0; max-width: 400px; color: var(--red-color); font-size: 1.6rem; line-height: 1.5em; text-align: center; } .subscribe-form .success .message-success { display: block; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; } @media (max-width: 650px) { .subscribe-form-title { font-size: 2.4rem; } .subscribe-form-description { font-size: 1.6rem; } } @media (max-width: 500px) { .subscribe-form form { display: flex; flex-direction: column; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { margin: 0 0 0 0; } .subscribe-form .form-group { display: flex; flex-direction: column; width: 100%; } .subscribe-form button { display: flex; margin: 0 0 0 0; width: 100%; } } .subscribe-close-button { position: absolute; top: 16px; right: 20px; z-index: 2000; display: block; width: 40px; height: 40px; } .subscribe-close-button:before { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:after { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(-45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:hover { cursor: default; } /\*.message-success, .message-error, .message-loading { display: none; }\*/ /\*.message-success .success { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; } .message-error.error { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\*/ /\*.success .message-success, .error .message-error, .loading .message-loading { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\*/ /\*For TOC\*/ @media (min-width: 1200px) { .sticky-visible .sticky-toc { visibility: visible; opacity: 1; transform: translateY(0); } .toc-opened .sticky-toc { visibility: hidden; } } /\*.gh-portal-triggerbtn-iframe { } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-wrapper { background: #0000ff !important; } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-container { background: #0000ff !important; height: 10px !important; } \*/ .theme-dark:root { \--green-color: #66ff33 !important; \--orange-color: #ff5c33 !important; \--red-color: #ff3333 !important; \--purple-color: #ff00ff !important; \--brand-color: #5ceaff !important; \--white-color: #18141f !important; \--primary-text-color: #fff !important; \--secondary-text-color: #fff !important; } .feed-visibility-false { display: none; } /\*.feed-visibility-true { display: none; }\*/ :root { \--brand-color:#0000dd; \--white-color:#ffffff; \--primary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--secondary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--orange-color: #ff6600; \--purple-color: #cc33ff; } blockquote { font-weight: unset; letter-spacing: normal; font-style: normal; text-align: inherit; } table { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; white-space: unset !important; width=200px !important; } table td { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; } .theme-dark .CT-thumb { transform: translate(20px,0px); } .theme-light .CT-thumb { transform: translate(0px,0px); } /\*.u-text-format h3 { color: var(--darker-gray-color) ; }\*/ //Detect theme var existingTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\_theme'); if (!existingTheme) { if(navigator.platform.indexOf('Win') > -1) { existingTheme = "light"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: dark)').matches) { existingTheme = "dark"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: light)').matches) { existingTheme = "light"; } } //Implement light/dark theme if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctdark(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctlight(); } window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} gtag('js', new Date()); gtag('config', 'G-TZK0WDB1DH'); var clicky\_site\_ids = clicky\_site\_ids || []; clicky\_site\_ids.push(101323562); ![Clicky](//in.getclicky.com/101323562ns.gif) :root {--ghost-accent-color: #888888;} [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) - More on "multiple world-size economies per atom" By [Holden Karnofsky](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/ "Holden Karnofsky") Aug 27, 2021 8 min read More on "multiple world-size economies per atom" ================================================ A follow up on "This Can't Go On" for the skeptical. In [This Can't Go On](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/), I [argued](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#why-cant-this-go-on) that 8200 more years of today's growth rate would require us to sustain "multiple economies as big as today's entire world economy *per atom*." Feedback on this bit was split between "That is so obviously impossible, 8200 years of 2% growth is an absurd idea - growth will have to slow much before then" and "Why is that impossible? With ever-increasing creativity, we could increase quality of life higher and higher, without needing to keep using more and more material resources." Here I'm going to respond to the latter point, which means expanding on why 8200 years of 2% growth doesn't look like a reasonable thing to expect. I'm going to make lots of extremely wild assumptions and talk about all kinds of weird possibilities just so that I cover even far-fetched ways for 2% growth to continue. If you are already on team "Yeah, I don't see the world economy growing that much," you should skip this post unless you'd enjoy seeing the case made in a fair amount of detail. How we COULD support "multiple world-size economies per atom" \------------------------------------------------------------- I do think it's *conceivable* that we could support multiple world-size economies per atom. Here's one way: Say that we discover some new activity, or experience, or drug, that people really, really, REALLY value. Specifically, the market values it at 10^85 of today's US dollars (that's ten trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion dollars). That means it's valued about 10^71 times as much as everything the world produces in a year right now (combined).[1](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn1) Then, one person having this experience[2](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn2) would mean the size of the economy is at least $10^85. And that would, indeed, be the equivalent of multiple of today's world economies per atom.[3](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn3) To be clear, it's not that we would've crammed multiple of today's world economies into each atom. It's that we would've crammed something 10^71 times as valuable as today's world economy into a mere [10^28 atoms](https://science.howstuffworks.com/atoms-in-person.htm#:~:text=A%20human%20body%20weighing%20154,7%20followed%20by%2027%20zeros.) that make up a human being. What would it mean, though, to value a single experience 10^71 times as much as today's entire world economy? One way of thinking about it might be: * "A 1 in 10^71 chance of this thing being experienced would be as valuable as all of today's world economy." * Or to make it a bit easier to intuit (while needing to oversimplify), "If I were risk-neutral, I'd be thrilled to accept a gamble where I would die immediately, with near certainty, in exchange for a 1 in 10^71 chance of getting to have this experience."[4](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn4)* How near-certain would death be? Well, for starters, if all the people who have ever lived to date accepted this gamble, it would be approximately certain that they would *all* lose and end up with immediate death.[5](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn5)* But this really isn't coming anywhere close to communicating how bad the odds would be for this gamble. It's more like: if there were one person for each atom in the galaxy, and each of them took the gamble, they'd probably still **all** lose.[6](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn6)* So to personally take a gamble with those kinds of odds … the experience had better be REALLY good to compensate. \+ We're not talking about "the best experience you've ever had" level here - it wouldn't be sensible to value that more than an entire life, and the idea that it's worth as much as today's world economy seems pretty clearly wrong. \+ We're talking about something just unfathomably beyond anything any human has ever experienced. Blowing out the numbers more \---------------------------- Imagine the single best second of your life, the kind of thing evoked by [Letter from Utopia](https://www.nickbostrom.com/utopia.html): > Have you ever experienced a moment of bliss? On the rapids of inspiration maybe, your mind tracing the shapes of truth and beauty? Or in the pulsing ecstasy of love? Or in a glorious triumph achieved with true friends? Or in a conversation on a vine-overhung terrace one star-appointed night? Or perhaps a melody smuggled itself into your heart, charming it and setting it alight with kaleidoscopic emotions? Or when you prayed, and felt heard? > If you have experienced such a moment – experienced *the best type* of such a moment – then you may have discovered inside it a certain idle but sincere thought: "Heaven, yes! I didn't realize it could be like this. This is so right, on whole different level of right; so real, on a whole different level of real. Why can't it be like this always? Before I was sleeping; now I am awake." Yet a little later, scarcely an hour gone by, and the ever-falling soot of ordinary life is already covering the whole thing. The silver and gold of exuberance lose their shine, and the marble becomes dirty. Now imagine, implausibly, that this single second was worth as much as the entire world economy outputs in a year today. (It doesn't seem possible that it could be worth more, since the world economy that year *included* that second of your life, plus the rest of your year and many other people's years.) And now imagine a *full year* in which *every second* is as good as *that second.* We'll call this the "perfect year." According to the assumptions above, the perfect year would be no more than about 3\*10^8 times as valuable as the world economy (there are about 3\*10^8 seconds in a year). And now imagine that *every atom in the galaxy* could be a person having the perfect year. This would now be about 10^70 \* (3 \* 10^8) = 3\*10^78 as much value as today's world economy. **2% growth would get us there in 9150 years.** (A crucial and perhaps counterintuitive assumption I'm making here, throughout, is that "2% growth" means "2% *really real* growth" - that whatever is valuable, holistically speaking, about annual world output today, we'll get 2% more of it each year. I think this is already the kind of assumption many people are making when they say we don't need more material to have ever-increasing wealth. If you think the 2% growth of the recent past is more "fake" than this and that it will continue in a "fake" way, that would be a debate for another time.) And 1200 years after *that*, if each year still had 2% growth, the economy would be another ~20 billion times bigger. So now, for every atom in the galaxy, there'd have to be someone whose year was in some sense ~20 billion times *better* (or "more valuable") than the perfect year. We're still only talking about ~10,000 years of 2% growth. New life forms \-------------- It's still conceivable! Who knows what the future will bring. But at this point it's very intuitive to me that we are not talking about anything that looks like "Humans in human bodies having human kinds of fun and fulfillment." An economy of this value seems to require fundamentally re-engineering something about the human experience - finding some way of arranging matter that creates far more happiness, or fulfillment, or something, that we would value so astronomically more than even the heights of human experience today. And I think the most natural way for that to happen is something like: "Discovering fundamental principles behind what we value, and fundamental principles of how to arrange matter to get the most of it." Which in turn suggests something more like "Once we have that level of understanding, we start to arrange the matter in the galaxy optimally, and quickly get close to the limits of what's possible" than like "We grow at 2%, every year, for continuing thousands of years, even as (as would happen with e.g. [digital people](https://www.cold-takes.com/how-digital-people-could-change-the-world/)) we become beings who can do as much in a year as humans could do in hundreds or thousands of years." But it could still happen? \-------------------------- I guess? This was never meant to be a mathematical proof of the impossibility of 2%/year growth. It's possible in theory. But at this point, seeing what a funky and fundamentally transformed galaxy it would require within 10,000 years, what is the *affirmative* reason to expect 2%/year growth for that long a period of time? Is it that "This is the trendline, and by default I expect the trendline to continue?" But that trendline is only a couple hundred years old - why expect it to continue for another 10,000? Why not, instead, expect the *[longer-term pattern of accelerating economic growth](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#explosion-and-collapse)* to be what continues, until we approach some sort of fundamental limit on how much value we can cram into a given amount of matter? Or expect growth to fall gradually from here and never reach today's level again? The last couple of centuries have been a wild ride, with wealth and living conditions improving at a historically high rate. But I don't think that gives us reason to think that this trend goes to infinity. I believe the limits are somewhere, and it looks like sometime in the next 10,000 years, we're either going to have to approach those limits, or [stagnate or collapse](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#why-cant-this-go-on). Hopefully I've given a sense for why it seems so unlikely that there will be 10,000 more years in the future that each have 2% or greater growth. Which would imply that *each* of the last 100+ years will turn out to be one of the fastest-growing 10,000 years of all time. If you'd like to comment on this post, [this](https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/pFHN3nnN9WbfvWKFg/this-can-t-go-on?commentId=K3ESWKD3Kk5ywN7MP) would be a good place to do so. [![Twitter](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-twitter-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/twitter/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [![Facebook](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-facebook-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/facebook/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [![Reddit](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-reddit-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/reddit/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [![More](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-addthis-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/menu/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [Subscribe](https://www.cold-takes.com/more-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom/#/portal/signup/free) [Feedback](https://www.guidedtrack.com/programs/4kal2ue/run?posttitle=More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D) \--- Footnotes \--------- 1\. Today's economy is a bit less than $10^14 per year ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_world_product)). $10^85 = $10^14 \* 10^71. [↩](#fnref1)- (And paying full price for it, in a way that gets recorded by GDP statistics, which could get a bit hairy.) [↩](#fnref2)- See [previous estimate](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#fn7) of 10^70 atoms in the galaxy. [↩](#fnref3)- This assumes that one values one's own life not much more than a year of the world economy's output. I do not expect that I will see enough disagreement on this point to want to write another post on the matter, but it's possible. It is also making an iffy assumption about "risk-neutrality." In reality, one might personally value this experience much less than 10^71 times as much as one's own life, while still paying resources for it that would be sufficient to save an extraordinarily large number of *other* people's lives. It's hard to convey the same kind of magnitudes by appealing to impartiality, so I went with this intuition pump anyway; I think it does give the right basic sense of how mind-bogglingly large the value of this experience would be. [↩](#fnref4)- The calculation here would be: if there are 10^10 people alive today (this is "rounding up" from ~8 billion to 10 billion), and each has a 10^-71 (1 in 10^71) chance of winning the gamble, then each has a (1-10^-71) chance of losing the gamble. So the probability that they **all** lose the gamble is (1-10^-71)^(10^10), which is almost exactly 100%. [↩](#fnref5)- Similar calculation to the previous footnote, but with a population of 10^70 (one for each [atom in the galaxy](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#fn7)), so the probability that they all lose the gamble is (1-10^-71)^(10^70), which I think is around 90% (Excel can't actually handle numbers this big but this is what similar calculations imply). [↩](#fnref6)- (Footnote deleted) [↩](#fnref7) For email filter: florpschmop Powered by [Ghost](https://ghost.org/) #### Popular tags [sports](/tag/sports/) [innovationstagnation](/tag/innovationstagnation/) [2star](/tag/2star/) [utopia](/tag/utopia/) Subscribe to Cold Takes ======================= For audio version, search for "Cold Takes Audio" in your podcast app Subscribe **Great!** Check your inbox and click the link to confirm your subscription. **If you don't see it, check your spam!** Please enter a valid email address! $("#lower-right-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1458'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-1").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-2").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#cover-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1472'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#footer-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1473'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#final-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1474'); }); //When someone clicks an anchor link, I want the sticky nav to go away. $("a").click(function(f) { body.removeClass('sticky-visible'); lastSt = 9999999999999}); function ctlight() { html.removeClass('theme-dark').addClass('theme-light'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\_theme', 'light'); //$(".gh-portal-triggerbtn-container").css("background","#0000dd"); /\* document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#0000dd'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#ffffff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#1a1a1a'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#1a1a1a');\*/ // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(0px,0)"); // $(".single-content").css("font-weight","400"); existingTheme = "light"; } function ctdark() { html.removeClass('theme-light').addClass('theme-dark'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\_theme', 'dark'); /\*document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#5ceaff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#18141f'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#fff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#fff');\*/ //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#14101b'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#121212'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#282c35'); //$(".single-content").css("font-weight","300"); // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(19px,0)"); existingTheme = "dark"; } //For light/dark toggle $(".CT-toggle").click(function(g) { g.preventDefault(); if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctlight(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctdark(); } } ); // Parse the URL parameter, then log goal if it is a completed subscription. Weird that it takes this much code to do this. function getParameterByName(name, url) { if (!url) url = window.location.href; name = name.replace(/[\[\]]/g, "\\$&"); var regex = new RegExp("[?&]" + name + "(=([^&#]\*)|&|#|$)"), results = regex.exec(url); if (!results) return null; if (!results[2]) return ''; return decodeURIComponent(results[2].replace(/\+/g, " ")); } // Give the parameter a variable name var action = getParameterByName('action'); var success = getParameterByName('success'); $(document).ready(function () { // Success === null is here for backwards compatibility if (action == 'subscribe' && (success === null || success == 'true')) { clicky.goal('1476'); } });

More on “multiple world-size economies per atom” var siteUrl = 'https://www.cold-takes.com'; var localTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\\_theme'); switch (localTheme) { case 'dark': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-dark'); break; case 'light': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-light'); break; default: break; } { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Article", "publisher": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "Cold Takes", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/favicon.ico", "width": 48, "height": 48 } }, "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Holden Karnofsky", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/07/HK-headshot-current---compressed-1.jpg", "width": 1600, "height": 1067 }, "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/author/holden/", "sameAs": [ "https://www.cold-takes.com/about/" ] }, "headline": "More on “multiple world-size economies per atom”", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/more-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom/", "datePublished": "2021-08-27T18:07:27.000Z", "dateModified": "2021-08-28T09:04:01.000Z", "description": "A follow up on "This Can't Go On" for the skeptical.", "mainEntityOfPage": { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://www.cold-takes.com/" } } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content, .gh-post-upgrade-cta { display: flex; flex-direction: column; align-items: center; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Roboto, Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; text-align: center; width: 100%; color: #ffffff; font-size: 16px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content { border-radius: 8px; padding: 40px 4vw; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta h2 { color: #ffffff; font-size: 28px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; margin: 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta p { margin: 20px 0 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta small { font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a { color: #ffffff; cursor: pointer; font-weight: 500; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a:hover { color: #ffffff; opacity: 0.8; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn { display: block; background: #ffffff; text-decoration: none; margin: 28px 0 0; padding: 8px 18px; border-radius: 4px; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn:hover { opacity: 0.92; } .shaded-table { color: #000000; border: 1px solid; vertical-align: top; } .shaded-table a { color: #0000dd; } .sticky-subscribe-div { z-index: 1000; position: fixed; bottom: 25px; right: 25px; max-width: 500px; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1; } .sticky-subscribe-button { cursor: pointer; padding: 20px; background: var(--brand-color); color: var(--white-color); border-radius: 50px; border-style: none; } .subscribe-overlay { position: fixed; top: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0; left: 0; z-index: 2000; display: flex; justify-content: center; align-items: center; background: var(--white-color); opacity: 0; transition: opacity 0.3s ease-in; pointer-events: none; } .subscribe-overlay:target { z-index: 2001; opacity: 0.95; pointer-events: auto; } .subscribe-form { margin: 1.5em 0; padding: 6.5vh 7vw 8vh; border-style: solid !important; border: var(--mid-gray-color); border-radius: 10px; text-align: center; } .subscribe-overlay-title { display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 10px 0; font-size: 3rem; line-height: 1.15em; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-overlay-description { margin: 0 auto 50px; max-width: 500px; color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 2rem; line-height: 1.3em; opacity: 0.8; } .subscribe-form .form-group { align-self: stretch; display: flex; } .subscribe-email { padding: 10px; border: 1px solid; border-color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 1.8rem; line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; user-select: text; transition: border-color 0.15s linear; -webkit-appearance: none; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { word-break: normal; position: relative; display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 0 10px; padding: 0 20px; height: 43px; outline: none; font-size: 1.5rem; line-height: 39px; font-weight: 400; background: var(--brand-color); border-radius: 5px; color: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .button-loader, .subscribe-form .message-success, .subscribe-form .message-error { display: none; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-content { visibility: hidden; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-loader { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 50%; display: inline-block; margin-left: -19px; transform: scale(0.7); } .subscribe-overlay .loading .button-loader { top: 5px; } .subscribe-form .button-loader svg path, .subscribe-form .button-loader svg rect { fill: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .success .message-success, .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; margin: 1em auto 0; max-width: 400px; color: var(--red-color); font-size: 1.6rem; line-height: 1.5em; text-align: center; } .subscribe-form .success .message-success { display: block; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; } @media (max-width: 650px) { .subscribe-form-title { font-size: 2.4rem; } .subscribe-form-description { font-size: 1.6rem; } } @media (max-width: 500px) { .subscribe-form form { display: flex; flex-direction: column; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { margin: 0 0 0 0; } .subscribe-form .form-group { display: flex; flex-direction: column; width: 100%; } .subscribe-form button { display: flex; margin: 0 0 0 0; width: 100%; } } .subscribe-close-button { position: absolute; top: 16px; right: 20px; z-index: 2000; display: block; width: 40px; height: 40px; } .subscribe-close-button:before { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:after { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(-45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:hover { cursor: default; } /\\*.message-success, .message-error, .message-loading { display: none; }\\*/ /\\*.message-success .success { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; } .message-error.error { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\\*/ /\\*.success .message-success, .error .message-error, .loading .message-loading { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\\*/ /\\*For TOC\\*/ @media (min-width: 1200px) { .sticky-visible .sticky-toc { visibility: visible; opacity: 1; transform: translateY(0); } .toc-opened .sticky-toc { visibility: hidden; } } /\\*.gh-portal-triggerbtn-iframe { } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-wrapper { background: #0000ff !important; } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-container { background: #0000ff !important; height: 10px !important; } \\*/ .theme-dark:root { \--green-color: #66ff33 !important; \--orange-color: #ff5c33 !important; \--red-color: #ff3333 !important; \--purple-color: #ff00ff !important; \--brand-color: #5ceaff !important; \--white-color: #18141f !important; \--primary-text-color: #fff !important; \--secondary-text-color: #fff !important; } .feed-visibility-false { display: none; } /\\*.feed-visibility-true { display: none; }\\*/ :root { \--brand-color:#0000dd; \--white-color:#ffffff; \--primary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--secondary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--orange-color: #ff6600; \--purple-color: #cc33ff; } blockquote { font-weight: unset; letter-spacing: normal; font-style: normal; text-align: inherit; } table { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; white-space: unset !important; width=200px !important; } table td { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; } .theme-dark .CT-thumb { transform: translate(20px,0px); } .theme-light .CT-thumb { transform: translate(0px,0px); } /\\*.u-text-format h3 { color: var(--darker-gray-color) ; }\\*/ //Detect theme var existingTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\\_theme'); if (!existingTheme) { if(navigator.platform.indexOf('Win') > -1) { existingTheme = "light"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: dark)').matches) { existingTheme = "dark"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: light)').matches) { existingTheme = "light"; } } //Implement light/dark theme if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctdark(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctlight(); } window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} gtag('js', new Date()); gtag('config', 'G-TZK0WDB1DH'); var clicky\\_site\\_ids = clicky\\_site\\_ids || []; clicky\\_site\\_ids.push(101323562); ![Clicky](//in.getclicky.com/101323562ns.gif) :root {--ghost-accent-color: #888888;} [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) - More on “multiple world-size economies per atom” By [Holden Karnofsky](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/ "Holden Karnofsky") Aug 27, 2021 8 min read More on “multiple world-size economies per atom” ================================================ A follow up on "This Can't Go On" for the skeptical. In [This Can’t Go On](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/), I [argued](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#why-cant-this-go-on) that 8200 more years of today’s growth rate would require us to sustain “multiple economies as big as today's entire world economy *per atom*.” Feedback on this bit was split between “That is so obviously impossible, 8200 years of 2% growth is an absurd idea - growth will have to slow much before then” and “Why is that impossible? With ever-increasing creativity, we could increase quality of life higher and higher, without needing to keep using more and more material resources.” Here I’m going to respond to the latter point, which means expanding on why 8200 years of 2% growth doesn’t look like a reasonable thing to expect. I’m going to make lots of extremely wild assumptions and talk about all kinds of weird possibilities just so that I cover even far-fetched ways for 2% growth to continue. If you are already on team “Yeah, I don’t see the world economy growing that much,” you should skip this post unless you'd enjoy seeing the case made in a fair amount of detail. How we COULD support “multiple world-size economies per atom” \------------------------------------------------------------- I do think it’s *conceivable* that we could support multiple world-size economies per atom. Here’s one way: Say that we discover some new activity, or experience, or drug, that people really, really, REALLY value. Specifically, the market values it at 10^85 of today’s US dollars (that’s ten trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion dollars). That means it's valued about 10^71 times as much as everything the world produces in a year right now (combined).[1](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn1) Then, one person having this experience[2](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn2) would mean the size of the economy is at least $10^85. And that would, indeed, be the equivalent of multiple of today’s world economies per atom.[3](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn3) To be clear, it’s not that we would’ve crammed multiple of today’s world economies into each atom. It’s that we would’ve crammed something 10^71 times as valuable as today’s world economy into a mere [10^28 atoms](https://science.howstuffworks.com/atoms-in-person.htm#:~:text=A%20human%20body%20weighing%20154,7%20followed%20by%2027%20zeros.) that make up a human being. What would it mean, though, to value a single experience 10^71 times as much as today’s entire world economy? One way of thinking about it might be: * “A 1 in 10^71 chance of this thing being experienced would be as valuable as all of today’s world economy.” * Or to make it a bit easier to intuit (while needing to oversimplify), “If I were risk-neutral, I’d be thrilled to accept a gamble where I would die immediately, with near certainty, in exchange for a 1 in 10^71 chance of getting to have this experience.”[4](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn4)* How near-certain would death be? Well, for starters, if all the people who have ever lived to date accepted this gamble, it would be approximately certain that they would *all* lose and end up with immediate death.[5](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn5)* But this really isn’t coming anywhere close to communicating how bad the odds would be for this gamble. It’s more like: if there were one person for each atom in the galaxy, and each of them took the gamble, they'd probably still **all** lose.[6](https://www.cold-takes.com/p/864b10db-9ba3-4e6e-add3-5cad875af1b0#fn6)* So to personally take a gamble with those kinds of odds … the experience had better be REALLY good to compensate. \+ We’re not talking about “the best experience you’ve ever had” level here - it wouldn’t be sensible to value that more than an entire life, and the idea that it’s worth as much as today’s world economy seems pretty clearly wrong. \+ We’re talking about something just unfathomably beyond anything any human has ever experienced. Blowing out the numbers more \---------------------------- Imagine the single best second of your life, the kind of thing evoked by [Letter from Utopia](https://www.nickbostrom.com/utopia.html): > Have you ever experienced a moment of bliss? On the rapids of inspiration maybe, your mind tracing the shapes of truth and beauty? Or in the pulsing ecstasy of love? Or in a glorious triumph achieved with true friends? Or in a conversation on a vine-overhung terrace one star-appointed night? Or perhaps a melody smuggled itself into your heart, charming it and setting it alight with kaleidoscopic emotions? Or when you prayed, and felt heard? > If you have experienced such a moment – experienced *the best type* of such a moment – then you may have discovered inside it a certain idle but sincere thought: “Heaven, yes! I didn’t realize it could be like this. This is so right, on whole different level of right; so real, on a whole different level of real. Why can’t it be like this always? Before I was sleeping; now I am awake.” Yet a little later, scarcely an hour gone by, and the ever-falling soot of ordinary life is already covering the whole thing. The silver and gold of exuberance lose their shine, and the marble becomes dirty. Now imagine, implausibly, that this single second was worth as much as the entire world economy outputs in a year today. (It doesn’t seem possible that it could be worth more, since the world economy that year *included* that second of your life, plus the rest of your year and many other people’s years.) And now imagine a *full year* in which *every second* is as good as *that second.* We’ll call this the “perfect year.” According to the assumptions above, the perfect year would be no more than about 3\\*10^8 times as valuable as the world economy (there are about 3\\*10^8 seconds in a year). And now imagine that *every atom in the galaxy* could be a person having the perfect year. This would now be about 10^70 \\* (3 \\* 10^8) = 3\\*10^78 as much value as today’s world economy. **2% growth would get us there in 9150 years.** (A crucial and perhaps counterintuitive assumption I'm making here, throughout, is that "2% growth" means "2% *really real* growth" - that whatever is valuable, holistically speaking, about annual world output today, we'll get 2% more of it each year. I think this is already the kind of assumption many people are making when they say we don't need more material to have ever-increasing wealth. If you think the 2% growth of the recent past is more "fake" than this and that it will continue in a "fake" way, that would be a debate for another time.) And 1200 years after *that*, if each year still had 2% growth, the economy would be another ~20 billion times bigger. So now, for every atom in the galaxy, there’d have to be someone whose year was in some sense ~20 billion times *better* (or "more valuable") than the perfect year. We’re still only talking about ~10,000 years of 2% growth. New life forms \-------------- It’s still conceivable! Who knows what the future will bring. But at this point it’s very intuitive to me that we are not talking about anything that looks like “Humans in human bodies having human kinds of fun and fulfillment.” An economy of this value seems to require fundamentally re-engineering something about the human experience - finding some way of arranging matter that creates far more happiness, or fulfillment, or something, that we would value so astronomically more than even the heights of human experience today. And I think the most natural way for that to happen is something like: “Discovering fundamental principles behind what we value, and fundamental principles of how to arrange matter to get the most of it.” Which in turn suggests something more like “Once we have that level of understanding, we start to arrange the matter in the galaxy optimally, and quickly get close to the limits of what’s possible” than like “We grow at 2%, every year, for continuing thousands of years, even as (as would happen with e.g. [digital people](https://www.cold-takes.com/how-digital-people-could-change-the-world/)) we become beings who can do as much in a year as humans could do in hundreds or thousands of years.” But it could still happen? \-------------------------- I guess? This was never meant to be a mathematical proof of the impossibility of 2%/year growth. It’s possible in theory. But at this point, seeing what a funky and fundamentally transformed galaxy it would require within 10,000 years, what is the *affirmative* reason to expect 2%/year growth for that long a period of time? Is it that “This is the trendline, and by default I expect the trendline to continue?” But that trendline is only a couple hundred years old - why expect it to continue for another 10,000? Why not, instead, expect the *[longer-term pattern of accelerating economic growth](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#explosion-and-collapse)* to be what continues, until we approach some sort of fundamental limit on how much value we can cram into a given amount of matter? Or expect growth to fall gradually from here and never reach today's level again? The last couple of centuries have been a wild ride, with wealth and living conditions improving at a historically high rate. But I don’t think that gives us reason to think that this trend goes to infinity. I believe the limits are somewhere, and it looks like sometime in the next 10,000 years, we’re either going to have to approach those limits, or [stagnate or collapse](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#why-cant-this-go-on). Hopefully I’ve given a sense for why it seems so unlikely that there will be 10,000 more years in the future that each have 2% or greater growth. Which would imply that *each* of the last 100+ years will turn out to be one of the fastest-growing 10,000 years of all time. If you'd like to comment on this post, [this](https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/pFHN3nnN9WbfvWKFg/this-can-t-go-on?commentId=K3ESWKD3Kk5ywN7MP) would be a good place to do so. [![Twitter](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-twitter-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/twitter/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [![Facebook](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-facebook-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/facebook/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [![Reddit](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-reddit-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/reddit/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [![More](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-addthis-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/menu/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fmore-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D&ct;=1) [Subscribe](https://www.cold-takes.com/more-on-multiple-world-size-economies-per-atom/#/portal/signup/free) [Feedback](https://www.guidedtrack.com/programs/4kal2ue/run?posttitle=More%20on%20%E2%80%9Cmultiple%20world-size%20economies%20per%20atom%E2%80%9D) \--- Footnotes \--------- 1\. Today’s economy is a bit less than $10^14 per year ([source](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_world_product)). $10^85 = $10^14 \\* 10^71. [↩](#fnref1)- (And paying full price for it, in a way that gets recorded by GDP statistics, which could get a bit hairy.) [↩](#fnref2)- See [previous estimate](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#fn7) of 10^70 atoms in the galaxy. [↩](#fnref3)- This assumes that one values one’s own life not much more than a year of the world economy’s output. I do not expect that I will see enough disagreement on this point to want to write another post on the matter, but it’s possible. It is also making an iffy assumption about "risk-neutrality." In reality, one might personally value this experience much less than 10^71 times as much as one's own life, while still paying resources for it that would be sufficient to save an extraordinarily large number of *other* people's lives. It's hard to convey the same kind of magnitudes by appealing to impartiality, so I went with this intuition pump anyway; I think it does give the right basic sense of how mind-bogglingly large the value of this experience would be. [↩](#fnref4)- The calculation here would be: if there are 10^10 people alive today (this is "rounding up" from ~8 billion to 10 billion), and each has a 10^-71 (1 in 10^71) chance of winning the gamble, then each has a (1-10^-71) chance of losing the gamble. So the probability that they **all** lose the gamble is (1-10^-71)^(10^10), which is almost exactly 100%. [↩](#fnref5)- Similar calculation to the previous footnote, but with a population of 10^70 (one for each [atom in the galaxy](https://www.cold-takes.com/this-cant-go-on/#fn7)), so the probability that they all lose the gamble is (1-10^-71)^(10^70), which I think is around 90% (Excel can't actually handle numbers this big but this is what similar calculations imply). [↩](#fnref6)- (Footnote deleted) [↩](#fnref7) For email filter: florpschmop Powered by [Ghost](https://ghost.org/) #### Popular tags [sports](/tag/sports/) [innovationstagnation](/tag/innovationstagnation/) [2star](/tag/2star/) [utopia](/tag/utopia/) Subscribe to Cold Takes ======================= For audio version, search for "Cold Takes Audio" in your podcast app Subscribe **Great!** Check your inbox and click the link to confirm your subscription. **If you don't see it, check your spam!** Please enter a valid email address! $("#lower-right-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1458'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-1").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-2").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#cover-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1472'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#footer-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1473'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#final-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1474'); }); //When someone clicks an anchor link, I want the sticky nav to go away. $("a").click(function(f) { body.removeClass('sticky-visible'); lastSt = 9999999999999}); function ctlight() { html.removeClass('theme-dark').addClass('theme-light'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\\_theme', 'light'); //$(".gh-portal-triggerbtn-container").css("background","#0000dd"); /\\* document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#0000dd'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#ffffff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#1a1a1a'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#1a1a1a');\\*/ // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(0px,0)"); // $(".single-content").css("font-weight","400"); existingTheme = "light"; } function ctdark() { html.removeClass('theme-light').addClass('theme-dark'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\\_theme', 'dark'); /\\*document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#5ceaff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#18141f'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#fff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#fff');\\*/ //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#14101b'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#121212'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#282c35'); //$(".single-content").css("font-weight","300"); // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(19px,0)"); existingTheme = "dark"; } //For light/dark toggle $(".CT-toggle").click(function(g) { g.preventDefault(); if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctlight(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctdark(); } } ); // Parse the URL parameter, then log goal if it is a completed subscription. Weird that it takes this much code to do this. function getParameterByName(name, url) { if (!url) url = window.location.href; name = name.replace(/[\\[\\]]/g, "\\\$&"); var regex = new RegExp("[?&]" + name + "(=([^&#]\\*)|&|#|$)"), results = regex.exec(url); if (!results) return null; if (!results[2]) return ''; return decodeURIComponent(results[2].replace(/\\+/g, " ")); } // Give the parameter a variable name var action = getParameterByName('action'); var success = getParameterByName('success'); $(document).ready(function () { // Success === null is here for backwards compatibility if (action == 'subscribe' && (success === null || success == 'true')) { clicky.goal('1476'); } });


The gloves are off, the pants are on var siteUrl = 'https://www.cold-takes.com'; var localTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\_theme'); switch (localTheme) { case 'dark': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-dark'); break; case 'light': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-light'); break; default: break; } { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Article", "publisher": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "Cold Takes", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/favicon.ico", "width": 48, "height": 48 } }, "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Holden Karnofsky", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/07/HK-headshot-current---compressed-1.jpg", "width": 1600, "height": 1067 }, "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/author/holden/", "sameAs": [ "https://www.cold-takes.com/about/" ] }, "headline": "The gloves are off, the pants are on", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/the-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on/", "datePublished": "2021-08-26T19:06:44.000Z", "dateModified": "2021-08-26T19:12:34.000Z", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/08/winston-churchill-w-meter.png", "width": 1200, "height": 630 }, "description": "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its
pants on. - Winston Churchill
[https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/winston\_churchill\_103564]

(...Not really, though [https://professorbuzzkill.com/twain-lie-travels/])

I collect links that are good examples of "how much BS is floating around out
there unchecked." Though in many cases I haven't run everything to ground, and
it could be the debunking that's BS, or both the original and the debunking ...
so I do want the ", "mainEntityOfPage": { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://www.cold-takes.com/" } } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content, .gh-post-upgrade-cta { display: flex; flex-direction: column; align-items: center; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Roboto, Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; text-align: center; width: 100%; color: #ffffff; font-size: 16px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content { border-radius: 8px; padding: 40px 4vw; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta h2 { color: #ffffff; font-size: 28px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; margin: 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta p { margin: 20px 0 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta small { font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a { color: #ffffff; cursor: pointer; font-weight: 500; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a:hover { color: #ffffff; opacity: 0.8; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn { display: block; background: #ffffff; text-decoration: none; margin: 28px 0 0; padding: 8px 18px; border-radius: 4px; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn:hover { opacity: 0.92; } .shaded-table { color: #000000; border: 1px solid; vertical-align: top; } .shaded-table a { color: #0000dd; } .sticky-subscribe-div { z-index: 1000; position: fixed; bottom: 25px; right: 25px; max-width: 500px; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1; } .sticky-subscribe-button { cursor: pointer; padding: 20px; background: var(--brand-color); color: var(--white-color); border-radius: 50px; border-style: none; } .subscribe-overlay { position: fixed; top: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0; left: 0; z-index: 2000; display: flex; justify-content: center; align-items: center; background: var(--white-color); opacity: 0; transition: opacity 0.3s ease-in; pointer-events: none; } .subscribe-overlay:target { z-index: 2001; opacity: 0.95; pointer-events: auto; } .subscribe-form { margin: 1.5em 0; padding: 6.5vh 7vw 8vh; border-style: solid !important; border: var(--mid-gray-color); border-radius: 10px; text-align: center; } .subscribe-overlay-title { display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 10px 0; font-size: 3rem; line-height: 1.15em; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-overlay-description { margin: 0 auto 50px; max-width: 500px; color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 2rem; line-height: 1.3em; opacity: 0.8; } .subscribe-form .form-group { align-self: stretch; display: flex; } .subscribe-email { padding: 10px; border: 1px solid; border-color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 1.8rem; line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; user-select: text; transition: border-color 0.15s linear; -webkit-appearance: none; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { word-break: normal; position: relative; display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 0 10px; padding: 0 20px; height: 43px; outline: none; font-size: 1.5rem; line-height: 39px; font-weight: 400; background: var(--brand-color); border-radius: 5px; color: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .button-loader, .subscribe-form .message-success, .subscribe-form .message-error { display: none; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-content { visibility: hidden; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-loader { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 50%; display: inline-block; margin-left: -19px; transform: scale(0.7); } .subscribe-overlay .loading .button-loader { top: 5px; } .subscribe-form .button-loader svg path, .subscribe-form .button-loader svg rect { fill: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .success .message-success, .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; margin: 1em auto 0; max-width: 400px; color: var(--red-color); font-size: 1.6rem; line-height: 1.5em; text-align: center; } .subscribe-form .success .message-success { display: block; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; } @media (max-width: 650px) { .subscribe-form-title { font-size: 2.4rem; } .subscribe-form-description { font-size: 1.6rem; } } @media (max-width: 500px) { .subscribe-form form { display: flex; flex-direction: column; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { margin: 0 0 0 0; } .subscribe-form .form-group { display: flex; flex-direction: column; width: 100%; } .subscribe-form button { display: flex; margin: 0 0 0 0; width: 100%; } } .subscribe-close-button { position: absolute; top: 16px; right: 20px; z-index: 2000; display: block; width: 40px; height: 40px; } .subscribe-close-button:before { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:after { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(-45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:hover { cursor: default; } /\*.message-success, .message-error, .message-loading { display: none; }\*/ /\*.message-success .success { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; } .message-error.error { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\*/ /\*.success .message-success, .error .message-error, .loading .message-loading { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\*/ /\*For TOC\*/ @media (min-width: 1200px) { .sticky-visible .sticky-toc { visibility: visible; opacity: 1; transform: translateY(0); } .toc-opened .sticky-toc { visibility: hidden; } } /\*.gh-portal-triggerbtn-iframe { } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-wrapper { background: #0000ff !important; } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-container { background: #0000ff !important; height: 10px !important; } \*/ .theme-dark:root { \--green-color: #66ff33 !important; \--orange-color: #ff5c33 !important; \--red-color: #ff3333 !important; \--purple-color: #ff00ff !important; \--brand-color: #5ceaff !important; \--white-color: #18141f !important; \--primary-text-color: #fff !important; \--secondary-text-color: #fff !important; } .feed-visibility-false { display: none; } /\*.feed-visibility-true { display: none; }\*/ :root { \--brand-color:#0000dd; \--white-color:#ffffff; \--primary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--secondary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--orange-color: #ff6600; \--purple-color: #cc33ff; } blockquote { font-weight: unset; letter-spacing: normal; font-style: normal; text-align: inherit; } table { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; white-space: unset !important; width=200px !important; } table td { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; } .theme-dark .CT-thumb { transform: translate(20px,0px); } .theme-light .CT-thumb { transform: translate(0px,0px); } /\*.u-text-format h3 { color: var(--darker-gray-color) ; }\*/ //Detect theme var existingTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\_theme'); if (!existingTheme) { if(navigator.platform.indexOf('Win') > -1) { existingTheme = "light"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: dark)').matches) { existingTheme = "dark"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: light)').matches) { existingTheme = "light"; } } //Implement light/dark theme if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctdark(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctlight(); } window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} gtag('js', new Date()); gtag('config', 'G-TZK0WDB1DH'); var clicky\_site\_ids = clicky\_site\_ids || []; clicky\_site\_ids.push(101323562); ![Clicky](//in.getclicky.com/101323562ns.gif) :root {--ghost-accent-color: #888888;} [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) - The gloves are off, the pants are on By [Holden Karnofsky](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/ "Holden Karnofsky") Aug 26, 2021 4 min read The gloves are off, the pants are on ==================================== *A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on. - [Winston Churchill](https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/winston_churchill_103564)* *(...[Not really, though](https://professorbuzzkill.com/twain-lie-travels/))* I collect links that are good examples of "how much BS is floating around out there unchecked." Though in many cases I haven't run everything to ground, and it could be the debunking that's BS, or both the original and the debunking ... so I do want the lesson to be "Don't trust things you've heard," as opposed to "Trust this debunking." (I will probably make a future post devoted to debunking debunkings.) [Nice piece debunking various memes that are supposedly based on studies](http://danluu.com/dunning-kruger/): "the less someone knows about a subject, the more they think they know" (not actually Dunning-Kruger at all), "money doesn't make people happy" (it seems like it does when making some basic adjustments to the data - I think this point is well known by now), "people bounce back from setbacks (as well as positive events) and return to a fixed level of happiness" (guess not) and "type systems help in programming" (don't know what this one is about). You may have come across most of these, but here in one place are debunkings (of varying convincingness) of pretty much all of the famous old social psychology experiments that blew my mind when I was in my 20s: * [Disappointing replication of the "marshmallow" experiment](http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.<PHONE>8761661?journalCode=pssa&). * One person argues that [the Prison Experiment was a case of subjects behaving as their experimenters clearly wanted them to](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201310/why-zimbardo-s-prison-experiment-isn-t-in-my-textbook). * The Robbers Cave experiment [backstory sounds particularly dicey](https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/apr/16/a-real-life-lord-of-the-flies-the-troubling-legacy-of-the-robbers-cave-experiment): the experimenter tried to get two bands of boys to fight each other ala Lord of the Flies, failed miserably, tried again, succeeded, never mentioned the first time, and gained fame (despite even the 2nd try having the same issue as the Prison Experiment mentioned above). * Finally, someone reports that many of the Milgram participants' own reports of why they had administered electric shocks provides more support for "they didn't think the person was really being harmed" than for Milgram's theory ([link](https://digest.bps.org.uk/2017/12/12/interviews-with-milgram-participants-provide-little-support-for-the-contemporary-theory-of-engaged-followership/)). I think this is the least compelling of critiques listed here, as people will rationalize their behavior with all kinds of stuff. Via an old [Marginal Revolution post](https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/07/happiness-results-robust.html), here's a [study claiming that none of the famous findings about happiness are robust](https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w19950/w19950.pdf). As far as I can tell, the central claim is basically this general idea: say that Group A consists of two people who each rate their happiness 6/10. And Group B consists of one person rating their happiness 4/10, and another 7/10. In some fundamental sense, we don't know which group has higher 'average' happiness, because for all we know, each increment on the 1-10 scale could represent an extra '10 units' of happiness or an extra '10 times as many units' of happiness, or something else. Now, sometimes we might be able to know which group has higher average happiness despite this issue (for example, a two 7's and a 6 vs. two 8's and a 7), but the authors here argue that the famous happiness findings are not robust in this way. Which I think makes sense, though I hope to read this more closely later on. One of the studies I've found most mind-blowing (with video evidence!) was [this seeming demonstration that chimpanzees have better working memory than humans](https://twitter.com/BrianRoemmele/status/1213860120058220546) (at least for a particular, surprising task). But oops, [here is a very believable-sounding debunking](https://twitter.com/KrisSabbi/status/1214260415862956042) claiming that chimpanzees were trained extensively on the task, and similarly trained humans keep up just fine. Finally, here's a 2008 [study](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/210112) questioning the connection between exercise and certain mental health benefits in a convincing-seeming way. "Regular exercise is associated with reduced anxious and depressive symptoms in the population at large, but the association is not because of causal effects of exercise." The usual result is that exercise does cause such benefits, but this one looked at twin pairs and over-time changes: "Cross-sectional and longitudinal associations were small and were best explained by common genetic factors with opposite effects on exercise behavior and symptoms of anxiety and depression. In genetically identical twin pairs, the twin who exercised more did not display fewer anxious and depressive symptoms than the co-twin who exercised less. Longitudinal analyses showed that increases in exercise participation did not predict decreases in anxious and depressive symptoms." [![Twitter](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-twitter-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/twitter/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [![Facebook](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-facebook-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/facebook/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [![Reddit](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-reddit-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/reddit/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [![More](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-addthis-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/menu/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [Subscribe](https://www.cold-takes.com/the-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on//#/portal/signup/free) [Feedback](https://www.guidedtrack.com/programs/4kal2ue/run?posttitle=The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on) Powered by [Ghost](https://ghost.org/) #### Popular tags [sports](/tag/sports/) [innovationstagnation](/tag/innovationstagnation/) [2star](/tag/2star/) [utopia](/tag/utopia/) Subscribe to Cold Takes ======================= For audio version, search for "Cold Takes Audio" in your podcast app Subscribe **Great!** Check your inbox and click the link to confirm your subscription. **If you don't see it, check your spam!** Please enter a valid email address! $("#lower-right-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1458'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-1").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-2").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#cover-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1472'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#footer-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1473'); /\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#final-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1474'); }); //When someone clicks an anchor link, I want the sticky nav to go away. $("a").click(function(f) { body.removeClass('sticky-visible'); lastSt = 9999999999999}); function ctlight() { html.removeClass('theme-dark').addClass('theme-light'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\_theme', 'light'); //$(".gh-portal-triggerbtn-container").css("background","#0000dd"); /\* document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#0000dd'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#ffffff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#1a1a1a'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#1a1a1a');\*/ // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(0px,0)"); // $(".single-content").css("font-weight","400"); existingTheme = "light"; } function ctdark() { html.removeClass('theme-light').addClass('theme-dark'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\_theme', 'dark'); /\*document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#5ceaff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#18141f'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#fff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#fff');\*/ //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#14101b'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#121212'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#282c35'); //$(".single-content").css("font-weight","300"); // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(19px,0)"); existingTheme = "dark"; } //For light/dark toggle $(".CT-toggle").click(function(g) { g.preventDefault(); if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctlight(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctdark(); } } ); // Parse the URL parameter, then log goal if it is a completed subscription. Weird that it takes this much code to do this. function getParameterByName(name, url) { if (!url) url = window.location.href; name = name.replace(/[\[\]]/g, "\\$&"); var regex = new RegExp("[?&]" + name + "(=([^&#]\*)|&|#|$)"), results = regex.exec(url); if (!results) return null; if (!results[2]) return ''; return decodeURIComponent(results[2].replace(/\+/g, " ")); } // Give the parameter a variable name var action = getParameterByName('action'); var success = getParameterByName('success'); $(document).ready(function () { // Success === null is here for backwards compatibility if (action == 'subscribe' && (success === null || success == 'true')) { clicky.goal('1476'); } });

The gloves are off, the pants are on var siteUrl = 'https://www.cold-takes.com'; var localTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\\_theme'); switch (localTheme) { case 'dark': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-dark'); break; case 'light': document.documentElement.classList.add('theme-light'); break; default: break; } { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@type": "Article", "publisher": { "@type": "Organization", "name": "Cold Takes", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/", "logo": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/favicon.ico", "width": 48, "height": 48 } }, "author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Holden Karnofsky", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/07/HK-headshot-current---compressed-1.jpg", "width": 1600, "height": 1067 }, "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/author/holden/", "sameAs": [ "https://www.cold-takes.com/about/" ] }, "headline": "The gloves are off, the pants are on", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/the-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on/", "datePublished": "2021-08-26T19:06:44.000Z", "dateModified": "2021-08-26T19:12:34.000Z", "image": { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/08/winston-churchill-w-meter.png", "width": 1200, "height": 630 }, "description": "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its\npants on. - Winston Churchill\n[https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/winston\\_churchill\\_103564]\n\n(...Not really, though [https://professorbuzzkill.com/twain-lie-travels/])\n\nI collect links that are good examples of "how much BS is floating around out\nthere unchecked." Though in many cases I haven't run everything to ground, and\nit could be the debunking that's BS, or both the original and the debunking ...\nso I do want the ", "mainEntityOfPage": { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://www.cold-takes.com/" } } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content, .gh-post-upgrade-cta { display: flex; flex-direction: column; align-items: center; font-family: -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, 'Segoe UI', Roboto, Oxygen, Ubuntu, Cantarell, 'Open Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', sans-serif; text-align: center; width: 100%; color: #ffffff; font-size: 16px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta-content { border-radius: 8px; padding: 40px 4vw; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta h2 { color: #ffffff; font-size: 28px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; margin: 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta p { margin: 20px 0 0; padding: 0; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta small { font-size: 16px; letter-spacing: -0.2px; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a { color: #ffffff; cursor: pointer; font-weight: 500; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a:hover { color: #ffffff; opacity: 0.8; box-shadow: none; text-decoration: underline; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn { display: block; background: #ffffff; text-decoration: none; margin: 28px 0 0; padding: 8px 18px; border-radius: 4px; font-size: 16px; font-weight: 600; } .gh-post-upgrade-cta a.gh-btn:hover { opacity: 0.92; } .shaded-table { color: #000000; border: 1px solid; vertical-align: top; } .shaded-table a { color: #0000dd; } .sticky-subscribe-div { z-index: 1000; position: fixed; bottom: 25px; right: 25px; max-width: 500px; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1; } .sticky-subscribe-button { cursor: pointer; padding: 20px; background: var(--brand-color); color: var(--white-color); border-radius: 50px; border-style: none; } .subscribe-overlay { position: fixed; top: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0; left: 0; z-index: 2000; display: flex; justify-content: center; align-items: center; background: var(--white-color); opacity: 0; transition: opacity 0.3s ease-in; pointer-events: none; } .subscribe-overlay:target { z-index: 2001; opacity: 0.95; pointer-events: auto; } .subscribe-form { margin: 1.5em 0; padding: 6.5vh 7vw 8vh; border-style: solid !important; border: var(--mid-gray-color); border-radius: 10px; text-align: center; } .subscribe-overlay-title { display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 10px 0; font-size: 3rem; line-height: 1.15em; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-overlay-description { margin: 0 auto 50px; max-width: 500px; color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 2rem; line-height: 1.3em; opacity: 0.8; } .subscribe-form .form-group { align-self: stretch; display: flex; } .subscribe-email { padding: 10px; border: 1px solid; border-color: var(--darker-gray-color); font-size: 1.8rem; line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; user-select: text; transition: border-color 0.15s linear; -webkit-appearance: none; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { word-break: normal; position: relative; display: inline-block; margin: 0 0 0 10px; padding: 0 20px; height: 43px; outline: none; font-size: 1.5rem; line-height: 39px; font-weight: 400; background: var(--brand-color); border-radius: 5px; color: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .button-loader, .subscribe-form .message-success, .subscribe-form .message-error { display: none; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-content { visibility: hidden; } .subscribe-form .loading .button-loader { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 50%; display: inline-block; margin-left: -19px; transform: scale(0.7); } .subscribe-overlay .loading .button-loader { top: 5px; } .subscribe-form .button-loader svg path, .subscribe-form .button-loader svg rect { fill: var(--white-color); } .subscribe-form .success .message-success, .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; margin: 1em auto 0; max-width: 400px; color: var(--red-color); font-size: 1.6rem; line-height: 1.5em; text-align: center; } .subscribe-form .success .message-success { display: block; color: var(--darker-gray-color); } .subscribe-form .invalid .message-error, .subscribe-form .error .message-error { display: block; } @media (max-width: 650px) { .subscribe-form-title { font-size: 2.4rem; } .subscribe-form-description { font-size: 1.6rem; } } @media (max-width: 500px) { .subscribe-form form { display: flex; flex-direction: column; } .subscribe-form .subscribe-overlay-button { margin: 0 0 0 0; } .subscribe-form .form-group { display: flex; flex-direction: column; width: 100%; } .subscribe-form button { display: flex; margin: 0 0 0 0; width: 100%; } } .subscribe-close-button { position: absolute; top: 16px; right: 20px; z-index: 2000; display: block; width: 40px; height: 40px; } .subscribe-close-button:before { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:after { content: ""; position: absolute; top: 20px; right: 4px; display: block; width: 32px; height: 1px; background: var(--darker-gray-color); opacity: 0.8; transform: rotate(-45deg); } .subscribe-close-button:hover { cursor: default; } /\\*.message-success, .message-error, .message-loading { display: none; }\\*/ /\\*.message-success .success { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; } .message-error.error { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\\*/ /\\*.success .message-success, .error .message-error, .loading .message-loading { visibility: visible; display: block; opacity: 1; }\\*/ /\\*For TOC\\*/ @media (min-width: 1200px) { .sticky-visible .sticky-toc { visibility: visible; opacity: 1; transform: translateY(0); } .toc-opened .sticky-toc { visibility: hidden; } } /\\*.gh-portal-triggerbtn-iframe { } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-wrapper { background: #0000ff !important; } .gh-portal-triggerbtn-container { background: #0000ff !important; height: 10px !important; } \\*/ .theme-dark:root { \--green-color: #66ff33 !important; \--orange-color: #ff5c33 !important; \--red-color: #ff3333 !important; \--purple-color: #ff00ff !important; \--brand-color: #5ceaff !important; \--white-color: #18141f !important; \--primary-text-color: #fff !important; \--secondary-text-color: #fff !important; } .feed-visibility-false { display: none; } /\\*.feed-visibility-true { display: none; }\\*/ :root { \--brand-color:#0000dd; \--white-color:#ffffff; \--primary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--secondary-text-color:#1a1a1a; \--orange-color: #ff6600; \--purple-color: #cc33ff; } blockquote { font-weight: unset; letter-spacing: normal; font-style: normal; text-align: inherit; } table { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; white-space: unset !important; width=200px !important; } table td { border: 1px solid; border-collapse: collapse; } .theme-dark .CT-thumb { transform: translate(20px,0px); } .theme-light .CT-thumb { transform: translate(0px,0px); } /\\*.u-text-format h3 { color: var(--darker-gray-color) ; }\\*/ //Detect theme var existingTheme = localStorage.getItem('dawn\\_theme'); if (!existingTheme) { if(navigator.platform.indexOf('Win') > -1) { existingTheme = "light"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: dark)').matches) { existingTheme = "dark"; } else if(window.matchMedia && window.matchMedia('(prefers-color-scheme: light)').matches) { existingTheme = "light"; } } //Implement light/dark theme if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctdark(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctlight(); } window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} gtag('js', new Date()); gtag('config', 'G-TZK0WDB1DH'); var clicky\\_site\\_ids = clicky\\_site\\_ids || []; clicky\\_site\\_ids.push(101323562); ![Clicky](//in.getclicky.com/101323562ns.gif) :root {--ghost-accent-color: #888888;} [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [About (+highlights)](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/) [Most Important Century](https://www.cold-takes.com/most-important-century/) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Subscribe (free)](#subscribe) [Cold Takes](https://www.cold-takes.com) - The gloves are off, the pants are on By [Holden Karnofsky](https://www.cold-takes.com/about/ "Holden Karnofsky") Aug 26, 2021 4 min read The gloves are off, the pants are on ==================================== *A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on. - [Winston Churchill](https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/winston_churchill_103564)* *(...[Not really, though](https://professorbuzzkill.com/twain-lie-travels/))* I collect links that are good examples of "how much BS is floating around out there unchecked." Though in many cases I haven't run everything to ground, and it could be the debunking that's BS, or both the original and the debunking ... so I do want the lesson to be "Don't trust things you've heard," as opposed to "Trust this debunking." (I will probably make a future post devoted to debunking debunkings.) [Nice piece debunking various memes that are supposedly based on studies](http://danluu.com/dunning-kruger/): "the less someone knows about a subject, the more they think they know" (not actually Dunning-Kruger at all), "money doesn’t make people happy" (it seems like it does when making some basic adjustments to the data - I think this point is well known by now), "people bounce back from setbacks (as well as positive events) and return to a fixed level of happiness" (guess not) and "type systems help in programming" (don't know what this one is about). You may have come across most of these, but here in one place are debunkings (of varying convincingness) of pretty much all of the famous old social psychology experiments that blew my mind when I was in my 20s: * [Disappointing replication of the "marshmallow" experiment](http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0956797618761661?journalCode=pssa&). * One person argues that [the Prison Experiment was a case of subjects behaving as their experimenters clearly wanted them to](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/freedom-learn/201310/why-zimbardo-s-prison-experiment-isn-t-in-my-textbook). * The Robbers Cave experiment [backstory sounds particularly dicey](https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/apr/16/a-real-life-lord-of-the-flies-the-troubling-legacy-of-the-robbers-cave-experiment): the experimenter tried to get two bands of boys to fight each other ala Lord of the Flies, failed miserably, tried again, succeeded, never mentioned the first time, and gained fame (despite even the 2nd try having the same issue as the Prison Experiment mentioned above). * Finally, someone reports that many of the Milgram participants' own reports of why they had administered electric shocks provides more support for "they didn't think the person was really being harmed" than for Milgram's theory ([link](https://digest.bps.org.uk/2017/12/12/interviews-with-milgram-participants-provide-little-support-for-the-contemporary-theory-of-engaged-followership/)). I think this is the least compelling of critiques listed here, as people will rationalize their behavior with all kinds of stuff. Via an old [Marginal Revolution post](https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/07/happiness-results-robust.html), here's a [study claiming that none of the famous findings about happiness are robust](https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w19950/w19950.pdf). As far as I can tell, the central claim is basically this general idea: say that Group A consists of two people who each rate their happiness 6/10. And Group B consists of one person rating their happiness 4/10, and another 7/10. In some fundamental sense, we don't know which group has higher 'average' happiness, because for all we know, each increment on the 1-10 scale could represent an extra '10 units' of happiness or an extra '10 times as many units' of happiness, or something else. Now, sometimes we might be able to know which group has higher average happiness despite this issue (for example, a two 7's and a 6 vs. two 8's and a 7), but the authors here argue that the famous happiness findings are not robust in this way. Which I think makes sense, though I hope to read this more closely later on. One of the studies I've found most mind-blowing (with video evidence!) was [this seeming demonstration that chimpanzees have better working memory than humans](https://twitter.com/BrianRoemmele/status/1213860120058220546) (at least for a particular, surprising task). But oops, [here is a very believable-sounding debunking](https://twitter.com/KrisSabbi/status/1214260415862956042) claiming that chimpanzees were trained extensively on the task, and similarly trained humans keep up just fine. Finally, here's a 2008 [study](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/210112) questioning the connection between exercise and certain mental health benefits in a convincing-seeming way. "Regular exercise is associated with reduced anxious and depressive symptoms in the population at large, but the association is not because of causal effects of exercise." The usual result is that exercise does cause such benefits, but this one looked at twin pairs and over-time changes: "Cross-sectional and longitudinal associations were small and were best explained by common genetic factors with opposite effects on exercise behavior and symptoms of anxiety and depression. In genetically identical twin pairs, the twin who exercised more did not display fewer anxious and depressive symptoms than the co-twin who exercised less. Longitudinal analyses showed that increases in exercise participation did not predict decreases in anxious and depressive symptoms." [![Twitter](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-twitter-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/twitter/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [![Facebook](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-facebook-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/facebook/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [![Reddit](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-reddit-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/reddit/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [![More](https://www.cold-takes.com/content/images/2021/06/ct-addthis-square.png)](https://api.addthis.com/oexchange/0.8/forward/menu/offer?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cold-takes.com%2Fthe-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on%2F&pubid;=ra-60a178324cffc42e&title;=Cold%20Takes%20-%20The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on&ct;=1) [Subscribe](https://www.cold-takes.com/the-gloves-are-off-the-pants-are-on//#/portal/signup/free) [Feedback](https://www.guidedtrack.com/programs/4kal2ue/run?posttitle=The%20gloves%20are%20off%2C%20the%20pants%20are%20on) Powered by [Ghost](https://ghost.org/) #### Popular tags [sports](/tag/sports/) [innovationstagnation](/tag/innovationstagnation/) [2star](/tag/2star/) [utopia](/tag/utopia/) Subscribe to Cold Takes ======================= For audio version, search for "Cold Takes Audio" in your podcast app Subscribe **Great!** Check your inbox and click the link to confirm your subscription. **If you don't see it, check your spam!** Please enter a valid email address! $("#lower-right-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1458'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-1").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#upper-right-subscribe-2").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1471'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#cover-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1472'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#footer-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1473'); /\\*LO.events.track('Subscribe-LR');\\*/ setTimeout(function(){$("#subscribe-input").focus();},500); }); $("#final-subscribe").click(function(f) { clicky.goal('1474'); }); //When someone clicks an anchor link, I want the sticky nav to go away. $("a").click(function(f) { body.removeClass('sticky-visible'); lastSt = 9999999999999}); function ctlight() { html.removeClass('theme-dark').addClass('theme-light'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\\_theme', 'light'); //$(".gh-portal-triggerbtn-container").css("background","#0000dd"); /\\* document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#0000dd'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#ffffff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#1a1a1a'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#1a1a1a');\\*/ // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(0px,0)"); // $(".single-content").css("font-weight","400"); existingTheme = "light"; } function ctdark() { html.removeClass('theme-light').addClass('theme-dark'); localStorage.setItem('dawn\\_theme', 'dark'); /\\*document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--brand-color', '#5ceaff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#18141f'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--primary-text-color', '#fff'); document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--secondary-text-color', '#fff');\\*/ //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#14101b'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#121212'); //document.documentElement.style.setProperty('--white-color', '#282c35'); //$(".single-content").css("font-weight","300"); // $("#CT-thumbID").css("transform","translate(19px,0)"); existingTheme = "dark"; } //For light/dark toggle $(".CT-toggle").click(function(g) { g.preventDefault(); if(existingTheme == "dark") { ctlight(); } else if(existingTheme == 'light') { ctdark(); } } ); // Parse the URL parameter, then log goal if it is a completed subscription. Weird that it takes this much code to do this. function getParameterByName(name, url) { if (!url) url = window.location.href; name = name.replace(/[\\[\\]]/g, "\\\$&"); var regex = new RegExp("[?&]" + name + "(=([^&#]\\*)|&|#|$)"), results = regex.exec(url); if (!results) return null; if (!results[2]) return ''; return decodeURIComponent(results[2].replace(/\\+/g, " ")); } // Give the parameter a variable name var action = getParameterByName('action'); var success = getParameterByName('success'); $(document).ready(function () { // Success === null is here for backwards compatibility if (action == 'subscribe' && (success === null || success == 'true')) { clicky.goal('1476'); } });