you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] 9 points 1 year ago* (7 children)

The essay Meditations on Moloch is powerful reading on this topic: https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/

For the record, I don't endorse Scott Alexander's opinions in general.

  • source
  • hideshow 7 child comments
  • [โ€“] 3 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    I think about that essay probably once a month at least.

    Maybe "Moloch Horror" would be a good Schelling point, since Lovecraft was a racist- oh wait that poet was a pedophile. Shit... "Cosmic horror" it is?

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 3 child comments
  • [โ€“] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    It had a profound impact on me when I read it years ago. It was a key influence on me constructing a personal religious cosmology and practice, with the purpose of reconciling my strong urges towards the spiritual with my reflexive scientific skepticism.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 2 child comments
  • [โ€“] 2 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    He is also a fantastic fiction author though.

    His advice for people with depression is also broadly probably pretty good - my wife has issues with it and we tried a couple of his recommendations she hadn't tried before, and supplementing OTC l methyl folate helped her significantly despite not having the mutation that commonly results in it being prescribed. And his talking about ketamine being a prospective treatment with some good indicators in research led to the best drug commercial ever, for spravato - esketamine nasal spray for treatment resistant depression.

  • source
  • parent
  • hideshow 1 child comment
  • He's a psychiatrist by profession so his opinions in that field I would hope were reasonable. His opinions on society and politics are another matter. I think his earlier writing is in general more reasonable than where he's ended up.

  • source
  • parent