Self-Improvement and Research Ethics (with Rob Wiblin)

1. Prioritize Buying Solutions

When facing a problem, first consider buying a product that directly solves it (e.g., an ergonomic chair for back pain), as this often requires less sustained effort than trying to change your personality.

2. Learn Specific Skills

If buying a solution isn’t feasible, focus on learning concrete skills (e.g., using spreadsheets for budgeting) as this is generally easier than fundamental personality change.

3. Build Systemic Workarounds

Create systems or routines to compensate for personal weaknesses (e.g., calendar reminders for forgetfulness) rather than attempting to change your inherent nature.

4. Personality Change as Last Resort

View fundamental personality shifts (e.g., becoming more conscientious) as a last resort for self-improvement, as they require sustained, gradual effort and consume significant emotional energy.

5. Model Future Self Realistically

When planning or adopting new habits, predict your future behavior based on your past actions, assuming you’ll be your ‘somewhat lazy’ self rather than an idealized version, to set achievable goals.

6. Bet on Your Future Actions

Before committing to a new behavior or tool, ask yourself if you would bet on your future self consistently following through, which helps provide a more objective assessment of likelihood.

7. Act for All Similar Situations

When making a decision, consider that your current action might set a precedent for all sufficiently similar future situations, potentially motivating you to make the ‘right’ choice (use with caution to avoid self-criticism).

8. Establish a Line Manager Check-in

Arrange a regular (e.g., weekly) meeting with a trusted colleague or mentor to report on progress, discuss challenges, and plan for the next period, providing crucial accountability and problem-solving support.

9. Chunk Projects for Motivation

Break down large, long-term projects into smaller, manageable chunks (10-20 hours of work) that allow for quick completion and immediate feedback, boosting motivation and reducing procrastination.

10. Involve Others for Commitment

If you struggle to finish projects, involve another person who will rely on your completion, as the social reinforcement and desire not to let them down can be a powerful motivator.

11. Re-align Intermediate Goals

Regularly review your intermediate goals to ensure they still align with your ultimate long-term objectives, preventing ‘goal drift’ where the means become confused with the ends.

12. Embrace Quitting Unproductive Work

Be willing to abandon projects that are no longer enjoyable, stimulating, or delivering sufficient value, rather than being trapped by sunk costs or a self-image of always sticking with things.

13. Engage Long-Form Conversations

Seek out and engage with long-form conversations (2-6 hours) to gain deep, nuanced understanding of complex topics and access tacit knowledge not found in shorter formats.

14. Seek Deeper Knowledge Sources

Move beyond popular media to academic papers, specialized podcasts, or direct expert conversations to acquire a more profound and accurate understanding of subjects.

15. Optimize Audio Playback Speed

Adjust the playback speed of audio content (podcasts, audiobooks) to the fastest comfortable rate to maximize information intake and enhance focus by keeping your brain actively engaged.

16. Use Audio to Boost Attention

Listen to audio content during activities like walking or chores to improve focus and attention span, leveraging times when you’re less prone to digital distractions.

17. Focus on Large, Immediate Effects

Prioritize self-experiments for interventions expected to produce very large, immediate, and repeatable effects, as these are easier to detect and provide strong evidence quickly.

18. Consider High-Variance Interventions

Explore high-variance interventions (e.g., certain medications) in self-experiments, provided tail risks are low, as they offer the potential for significant personal benefit even if average effects are small.

19. Expect Experiment Failure

Approach self-experimentation with the realistic expectation that most attempts will not yield desired results, requiring multiple trials (e.g., 5-10) to find one effective solution.

20. Simplify Your Values Model

When exploring your intrinsic values, aim to develop a simpler model (e.g., focusing on well-being) that explains most of your moral intuitions, rather than overcomplicating it to fit every edge case.

21. Use Thought Experiments for Self-Knowledge

Treat thought experiments as opportunities to learn psychological facts about your own values and decision-making processes, even if the scenarios are abstract or difficult to fully imagine.

22. Distrust Extreme Thought Experiments

Be skeptical of intuitions derived from thought experiments that involve impossible, unprecedented, or extremely large-scale scenarios, as human intuition is not well-adapted to such abstractions.

23. Implement Tiered Ethics Review

Advocate for a multi-tiered system of research ethics review, where low-risk studies receive minimal oversight, while high-risk medical interventions undergo rigorous scrutiny.

24. Enable Participant-Driven Ethics Feedback

For low-risk online studies, integrate mechanisms for participants to provide real-time ethical feedback and collectively pause studies if significant concerns arise.

25. Allow Informed Opt-in for Risky Trials

Permit individuals to voluntarily participate in high-risk human challenge trials or experimental treatments with full informed consent, especially when there’s potential for significant societal benefit and appropriate compensation.

26. Shift FDA to Advisory Role

Advocate for the FDA to transition towards an advisory role, clearly labeling unapproved treatments and facilitating systematic data collection, while granting individuals greater autonomy over their medical choices.

27. Improve Systematic Data Collection

Establish robust, systematic methods for collecting comprehensive data on both positive and negative effects of all medical treatments to provide clearer information for patients and regulators.

28. Increase Public Funding for Key Trials

Support increased public funding for trials of promising treatments (e.g., bright light therapy for SAD, head-to-head drug comparisons) that lack commercial incentive but could offer broad societal benefits.

29. Use Prediction Markets as Initial Guide

Consult prediction markets for a preliminary estimate of an event’s likelihood, especially when you lack an initial sense, but be mindful of potential biases, particularly in politically charged topics.

30. Combine Multiple Forecast Sources

For important predictions, synthesize information from various credible sources (e.g., prediction markets, polls, expert forecasters) by assigning weights based on trust, to form a more robust ‘dragonfly eye’ estimate.

31. Train Personal Forecasting Skills

Improve your own prediction accuracy by using calibration tools that provide real-time feedback on thousands of diverse predictions, helping to hone your judgment over time.