flâneur

A Map is Not a Blueprint: Why Fixing Nature Fails

blog.nateliason.com · 2,748 words · saved by 1 readers

Hi friends, today’s essay is about a mental model to protect you from the unintended consequences of scientific hubris. It might just save your life. If you’re new here, join the 45,000 other readers to get my next essay in your inbox. Upgrade to paid We should expect interventions and innovations ranging from Ozempic to hydroponics to embryo freezing to oat milk to fail, or at least have significant unexpected side effects, for a common fundamental reason. A way of seeing the world which, once you’ve added it to your visible wave spectrum, will induce a healthy skepticism of our many attempts to outwit biology. It starts with the Coastline Paradox. Say you hire three people to measure the coastline of an island. A few weeks later, they all come back and have wildly different answers! One of them thinks the coastline is 10 miles long. One thinks it’s 20 miles long. And another thinks it’s 30 miles long. Who is right? And how is this possible? It turns out that they’re all right, and th

Hi friends, today’s essay is about a mental model to protect you from the unintended consequences of scientific hubris. It might just save your life. If you’re new here, join the 45,000 other readers to get my next essay in your inbox. We should expect interventions and innovations ranging from Ozempic to hydroponics to embryo freezing to oat milk to fail, or at least have significant unexpected side effects, for a common fundamental reason. A way of seeing the world which, once you’ve added it to your visible wave spectrum, will induce a healthy skepticism of our many attempts to outwit…

saved by

related reading