While I think finding ways to make future generations healthier and smarter is a worthy goal, I don't think we understand enough yet to do this without potentially severe unintended consequences, and I wouldn't consider doing it myself with our current technology. It's a good bet that many of the seemingly deleterious mutations we'd like to eliminate also offer some benefit we don't understand- given that we have already discovered many instances of mutations with apparent intelligence/health tradeoffs, and disease resistance/health tradeoffs. If you're selecting embryo populations for mutations correlated with specific desirable traits, you should also expect that you are selecting for worse outcomes in all other potentially desirable dimensions including those that are potentially even more important than those optimized for, but we have no clear concept of, or labels for. If you do this at scale, you're also systematically selecting for a less diverse, less robust population.
Also, I think a lot of neurodivergent people (including myself, and probably quite a lot lot of other LWers) have become irrationally obsessed with their own childrens raw intelligence above all else, due to emotional trauma. Growing up and being labeled as gifted, but also having (at the time undiagnosed) ADHD, I strongly felt that the only thing people liked about me was my intelligence, and that without it I would be unworthy of love or friendships. The idea of my child not being exceptionally intelligent, and therefore suffering immensely was terrifying to me, and made me irrationally obsessed with something mostly outside my control. Indeed, I am a parent now, and my son is both exceptionally bright and neurodivergent, but I now understand now that neither I or him need to be exceptionally bright to be loved or accepted.... we just need to have boundaries, and choose to only associate with the (numerous) people that will accept or even like that we are different, rather than those that dislike it but tolerate us for what we can practically provide them. Moreover, what those people begrudgingly tolerated me for wasn't even my actual intelligence, but my ability to accomplish difficult things for them with my intense ADHD hyperfocus. Of course intelligence is extremely useful and important, but shouldn't be valued above all else out of a trauma derived sense of terror.
Interesting, thanks for sharing. I am also on the west coast, and wear wide brimmed hats (usually cowboy hats), which is somewhat unusual and many of the people comment on it, complement it, or ask me about it.
The truth is, I'm not really trying to make a fashion statement, I'm just bald and don't want to get cancer on my head... and this hat design is uniquely functional in that it blocks the sun, doesn't blow off in the wind, and doesn't look incredibly dorky and non-breathable like the nylon sun hats they sell at REI. Yet people make a big deal about it and the social dynamics of peoples reactions are confusing and surprising to me.
The social reactions are interesting... I am shy and introverted, so it ends up being a good ice breaker, as people approach me about the hat frequently, and they notice and remember me a lot more readily. I have (rarely) had some really negative reactions, usually also from very leftist people that say the hat made them assume I was a "conservative piece of ****" or something along those lines, and were very surprised I didn't fit that stereotype after talking to me. I very often get asked the exact same thing word for word: "I love your hat, where did you get it?" Yet those people are almost always already choosing to not wear hats, and I assume don't and won't actually buy and wear a hat, so I am a little confused about this question. My best guess is that they are trying to complement my style while qualifying that they aren't trying to 'hit' on me.
As someone that has been a strength athlete, and part of fitness communities for many years, I have never seen a real world instance of someone becoming generally less attractive to the opposite sex, or having trouble finding partners due to lifting weights.
Building noticeable amounts of muscle is much harder than most people who haven't tried to do so assume. The "grotesquely muscular" men on, e.g. bodybuilding magazines are essentially fake, and not something that really happens to people that lift weights, except for a few minutes in a staged photo that requires months of preparation. To get like that you need a combination of massive doses of steroids, weight training and perfect dieting as a literal full time job, and one in a million genetics... plus a combination of crash dieting and severe dehydration aka "water cutting" to time a photo or contest for a specific day. Even those guys just look "fit" during a normal day with normal clothes on.
Your average person that does hard strength training seriously say 2-4 times per week, but still eats mostly normal foods, and avoids steroids will get much physically stronger, but will rarely look extremely different from how they did before. They might look slightly healthier and more attractive, but often won't even be immediately noticeable as athletic, not alone "having huge grotesque muscles."
For muscle mass to be very visible you also need really low body fat, at least in the 10-15% range, and maintaining that long term without losing the muscle is really difficult. A young ~6' tall adult man with normal genetics won't be able to be that lean and be over about 190-200lbs, which means they will appear more 'skinny' than muscular if wearing clothing.
Late reply I know, but I wanted to add that I was very surprised by your take on Brett Kavanaugh, and wanted to explain my more negative interpretation of those events, as I see it as very helpful to Trump directly, and not about principles. Some points:
-Backing down from anything almost always involves giving up political power, and encourages people to challenge you in the future. Trump is known for consistently almost never giving up without a fight, even in situations like losing an election. This strongly discourages people from challenging you in the future, because they know it will be a big fight, even if they win.
-His goal appears to have been to install essentially a sycophant supreme court, that would consistently rule in his favor rather than based on laws, principles, etc. and Kavanaugh seemed to be someone likely to do this (and arguably has done so), and even more so after Trump fought so hard for him. It would have been very hard to find a replacement candidate like this.
-Why don't you find the sexual assault allegations credible? I think people should be assumed innocent until proven guilty, but they don't much seem like a conspiracy to me. Trump himself in his own words, e.g. statements on the "Access Hollywood" tape, and quotes about Epstein, etc. seems to frequently brag about being a sexual predator himself, and generally would not consider that a disqualification for any job.
Growing crops for biofuel cannot produce more carbon than it consumes over long time scales, because the only source of carbon available to the system is the carbon in the atmosphere. If they are saying biofuels aren't carbon neutral over long time scales, where is this extra unlimited supply of carbon coming from?
I'm not sure if you've read Mihály Csíkszentmihályi or not, but he argued that flow states are more likely when a task is more complex/challenging, and the person has a high level of appropriate skill that makes it possible (with substantial effort) to complete the task.
For me this often occurs while programming, sailing, or doing math- especially if I need to solve a new problem with those skills that will be especially challenging.
Once I'm in 'flow' it is a distinct mental experience - I am totally into it and lose any sense of time passing, or of needing to motivate myself until I am interrupted either by my own body, or by something external.
Cal Newport in Deep Work (his own word for flow work) defines "Deep Work" as anything that requires skills that would take at least a year to develop if a person was already generally educated, smart, and motivated.
I stopped using pomodoros for flow-work, because it would break my flow state. I've found roughly 2 hour chunks work better for flow, without any particular warning to stop me if I feel like going longer. If I am in flow, I want it to keep going as long as possible, until I am fatigued, or the problem is solved.
But I would have thought that if there was widespread 'central hypothyroidism', someone would have twigged by now, since that form does show up if you do a full panel of hormone tests
Which tests? I am not aware of any simple blood test that measures the endpoint of thyroid activity on metabolic rate (except, arguably, cholesterol levels), rather than just the state of the T4->TRH->TSH->T4 feedback loop.
mostly T4 with a bit of extra T3', but no-one has particularly clear ideas on what works and what doesn't or why
The challenge with T3 is it has a very short half-life, one would need to take very small doses impracticably often to achieve stable levels. Taking mostly T4 with a bit of T3 helps compensate for the reduction in T3 production due to feedback without the problems caused by trying to obtain nearly all T3 directly from a supplement.
Thanks for the reference to Ray Peat, I hadn't heard of him before. Can you link to the best expression of his thoughts?
His own essays at raypeat.com are the only accurate source, but can be challenging to read. Most of the summaries you will find online don't do him justice.
As I mentioned, I do actually sometimes get negative feedback from people, but overall the effect is positive, because it causes people to interact with me spontaneously when I have trouble initiating social interactions, and I've made quite a few good friends just from that. Being polarizing is way better than being neutral for meeting people and making friends. I also suspect being avoided by a person that would negatively judge someone they don't know just for wearing a hat is probably also a positive thing. It's a functional thing I need because I'm bald with pale skin and spend a lot of time outdoors in a sunny climate, so people that think that is "cringe" are most likely not nice people. I didn't choose to be bald, or sun sensitive, and haven't found anything else that works as well- and trust me I tried because I felt very awkward about wearing a noticeable hat at first. I would liken that to thinking eyeglasses, a wheelchair, or a cane are cringe.
Once I was publically mocked by a group of guys in eastern Europe (Czech Republic) that thought it was hilarious that I was probably a local, trying to dress like an American cowboy or something. It made their day, and mine when I responded verbally with an American accent, and they started apologizing and laughing.