BELIEFS
Beliefs for which my confidence is basically 100%:
- Consciousness exists
Other beliefs:
- The default state of the human mind is open, calm, and curious. Anytime we are not in that state it is because some part of the mind is blocking it.
- One inherent right of conscious minds is to adjust reality to make it more aligned with our ideal. Focus on what you want to see more of.
- Meaning is nebulous but is definitely an emergent property of conscious minds (rather than a discrete thing to be “found” in the universe). Conscious minds imbue meaning via attention. The oft-referenced meaning crisis is probably a result of insufficient agency over attention.1
- Raising the ceiling is usually better than raising the floor.
- Everyone is at least 10x more capable than they think.
- Knowledge is the key to solving all existing problems.
- Death has some upsides (e.g., cultural composting) but it is clearly a net negative; aging is a disease to be cured.
- Nearly all evil at scale is born from the desire to do good.
- Climate change will be solved by technological progress or not at all.
- Eating meat is morally wrong (animal suffering), cultured meat is the most likely gateway out.
- Most of what we believe is wrong.