Arguments For and Against Longtermism

August 30, 2022

Thanks to William MacAskill's excellent new book on the topic (What We Owe the Future), lots of people are talking about longtermism right now. For those not familiar with the concept, "longtermism" is the ethical view that "positively influencing the long-term future should be a key moral priority of our time." Below are some of my favorite arguments for longtermism, followed by some of my favorite against it. Note that I borrow from Will's book heavily here in the section on arguments ...

What’s the link between depression and anxiety?

January 10, 2021

This image is from my colleague Amanda Metskas’ post on the Clearer Thinking blog, “Understanding the two most common mental health problems in the world:” https://www.clearerthinking.org/post/understanding-the-two-most-common-mental-health-problems-in-the-world

If you study depression and anxiety (in the U.S.), you find that they are correlated to a shockingly high degree (e.g., in one of my studies, when I correlated PHQ-9 depression scale scores with GAD-7 anxiety scale scores, I found that r = 0.82 ). Additionally, many studies have found that SSRIs (and other medications) help people with both depression and anxiety, as do certain therapeutic modalities such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, suggesting further linkage. Fin...