Think about the things you use very often and/or for extended amounts of time. Buy the highest quality version of that that you can afford. For example shoes, chairs, beds, at any one time you will be in one of the three, so buy the best you can afford. Donating to a feel-good charity might also improve your happiness. The exact amount seems to be irrelevant.

Edit: Another possibility is to buy more than you actually need of items you use, like having multiple nail clippers at multiple locations for convenience instead of having to carry out one specific nailclipper.

I just use two cheap alarm clocks - one set to radio at fairly low volume, two minutes before the alarm on the other one goes off. The former wakes me up and lets me transition to consciousness, the latter kicks my ass out of bed. I find it works well. (This is something you should tailor to personal preferences, of course, but I figured I'd throw another idea in)

Is there some kind of psychological theory I should be aware of?

I found something long time ago in some PUA materials, but unfortunately I don't remember the source anymore. The central idea was this:

People don't say random stories. (At least the socially savvy don't.) People, consciously or not, select the stories that support the persona they want to project. So the rational approach would start by making a list of attributes you want to associate with yourself, and then select / modify / invent the stories that provide fictional evidence that you have these attributes.

A typical PUA advice would probably recommend this set of attributes for a heterosexual man:

• your life is full of adventures;
• you are able to overcome problems (you have the skills, and you stay mentally stable in adversity);
• you have loyal friends, who consider you their natural leader;
• women want you (this should not be a focus of the story, merely a background assumption).

Now your task is to create an story that is interesting to listen and contains all these attributes. For example:

"A few years ago you did something adventurous with your charming girlfriend (tried to travel across the desert in a car; or took a hike through an exotic jungle). Then something dangerous happened (your car hit a landmine that destroyed its motor; in a supposedly safe part of jungle you met a tiger). You were smart and quick enough to avoid the immediate danger (you catapulted yourself and your girlfriend from the car; you took the girlfriend and pushed her up on a tree, then you climbed up too). Your girlfriend was super scared, but you remained cool and said "honey, I don't know how, but trust me, we are going to solve this, and it will be a cool story afterwards". You demonstrated some more skills (built a guitar from the remains of the car; killed a squirrel on the tree and cooked it for a dinner). Then you called your good friends, who owe you for saving their lives in the past -- but that's another story, you could offer to tell her tonight at your own place, if she is interested -- and they immediately went there to help you, because you are a very high priority for them. Then you spent the rest of the day partying together and having a lot of fun." (Also you need some good explanation for why you are not with the amazing girlfriend anymore. She was a student from an exotic country, and she returned home to follow her career.)

If you are too honest to invent stories, just filter your own experience and find situations where you exhibited the desired traits. Feel free to slightly exaggerate your role; most people do.

What do you think is the relative advantage of LessWrong in nutritional advice for a specific medical problem over generic net info or your doctor? Not criticizing the choice, this isn't a rhetorical question and I might have done something similar, I'm genuinely curious.

I would add that most of those things can also be found in other sources; sometimes they have different names.

But the practical question is: have you read those "other sources"? If not, then the Sequences are a compressed form of a lot of useful stuff. They may be long, but reading all the original sources would be much longer. (This is not to discourage people from reading the other sources, just saying that if "that's too much text" is your real objection, then you probably haven't read them.)

I want to determine whether I ought to have children or not based on the consequences for the population, my child(ren) and me personally.

I reckon the demographic factor that is most relevant to this choice is my status as a mentally ill person.

My decision cycle lasts from now till my prime fertile years (till I’m 35).

I will have kids if:

The consequences for the population is good. If existing evidence suggests population growth is good then the consequences for population growth is good. Population growth is basically good. There may be some non-linearity to that public good in the far future and that is a problem the future recipients of this past public good beyond my decision cycle can solve.

Is this consequence modified by greater participation in the population growth by individuals with mental illness? I have no relevant evidence so I will be stick the most proximate generalisation that the consequences on population growth is good.

The consequences for the children are good.

Having a close family member affected by a mental illness is the largest known risk factor, to date

Therefore, relative to the general population, it is likely that the consequences for the children are bad. However, this is meaningful at a population level, rather than at the level of the child as I had intended to analyse. Regardless, I will adjust me interpretation of the consequences of population growth to be bad simulating that greater prevalence of risk factors in the population if mentally ill people participate at a greater level of reproduction.

Finally, are the consequences good for me?

Children cost hundreds of thousands of dollar’s in Western countries. The switching cost is tremendous. We may need not enumerate the trade from this angle, however, as there is a more psychologically proximate evidence-base to examine:

From the abstract for :

There are theoretical foundations in sociology for two seemingly incompatible positions: (1) children should have a strong negative impact on the psychological well-being of parents and (2) children should have a strong positive impact on the psychological well-being of parents. Most empirical analyses yield only a modest relationship between parenthood and psychological well-being. Usually, but not always, it is negative. In this study we consider the relationship between parental status and several dimensions of psychological well-being. Our analysis is based on data from a large national survey. It suggests that children have positive and negative effects on the psychological well-being of parents. The balance of positive and negative effects associated with parenthood depends on residential status of the child, age of youngest child, marital status of the parent, and the particular dimension of psychological well-being examined. When compared with nonparents, parents with children in the home have low levels of affective well-being and satisfaction, and high levels of life-meaning; parents with adult children living away from home have high levels of affective well-being, satisfaction, and life-meaning.

Scholarly evidence clearly favours non-parenthood for personal well-being.

Given the negative consequences for the general population and the individual with mental illness, and the uncertainty in forecasting consequences for the children themselves, not having children dominates the choice to have children.

I had to give up on trying to find out if a tattoo can count as consent on its own

The core question isn't whether it can legally count as consent but whether the process that a medical team uses when it finds a dead body recognizes the tattoo.

I would think that as long as you updated it at least as often as you update your driver's licence, it would remain a valid indicator of your intent.

Why? Doctors have procedures for how to deal with organ donations. That procedure means looking at driver's license and organ donor cards. There are huge legal risks for them being creative.

Have you checked first that tattoos do not affect organ donation eligibility, or have any legal/medical weight whatsoever compared to, say, an organ donor card or check on your driver's license?

Damn, I'd better just get a card then. Thank you!