Three anecdotes from a blog post is not exactly strong evidence. I think these anecdotes do not make the case very well. The economy returned to trend in world war II, but would it have done the same if the Axis had won? It says the american revolution had no effect on the development of freedom and democracy, but is there proof of that? It certainly played a role in the french revolution, for example.
Overall, despite the weak case, there probably are some historical trends that exist, but this doesn’t mean that the world can’t be radically altered by small changes. The latter is absolutely true. There is no contradiction between the two positions.
Yeah, to be fair, I do think that the broad trend argument is probably the strongest argument for longtermism. Like, it appears that humanity has continuously expanded and grown for the past 12,000 years. If this trend continues, then it makes sense to think that eventually we’ll have the technology to start expanding into space.
Three anecdotes from a blog post is not exactly strong evidence. I think these anecdotes do not make the case very well. The economy returned to trend in world war II, but would it have done the same if the Axis had won? It says the american revolution had no effect on the development of freedom and democracy, but is there proof of that? It certainly played a role in the french revolution, for example.
Overall, despite the weak case, there probably are some historical trends that exist, but this doesn’t mean that the world can’t be radically altered by small changes. The latter is absolutely true. There is no contradiction between the two positions.
Yeah, to be fair, I do think that the broad trend argument is probably the strongest argument for longtermism. Like, it appears that humanity has continuously expanded and grown for the past 12,000 years. If this trend continues, then it makes sense to think that eventually we’ll have the technology to start expanding into space.