Open Thread 245

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This is the weekly visible open thread. Post about anything you want, ask random questions, whatever. ACX has an unofficial subreddit, Discord, and bulletin board, and in-person meetups around the world. 95% of content is free, but for the remaining 5% you can subscribe here. In this week’s news:

1: Neil Thanedar of LabDoor doesn’t agree with the way I characterized his company on my post on supplements and has a response up here. I have edited the post slightly to be more noncommittal until I can explain my reasoning - which I hope to do on a Highlights From The Comments post eventually.

2: Edwin Chen has surveyed some people on whether the Imagen images on my AI art post match the prompts, and most people believe that 1-2 do, rather than the 3 I claimed. Given that, I am retracting my claim to have won the bet - which I guess is still on - and adding this to my Mistakes page. Sorry to Vitor and others. I will revisit this sometime in or before 2025, I guess!

3: Alexandros Marinos continues his critique of my ivermectin post, and his broader ivermectin advocacy. I can’t remember if I’ve said this before, but I commit to writing a summary and response within four months of him being done, which as far as I can tell is not yet (yes, four months is a long time, but it’s a long series and I’m really busy this winter). His most recent post argues that the big COVID drug trials (TOGETHER, ACTIV-6, COVID-OUT) haven’t made their data public, and offers to donate $25,000 to a charity of my choice if I can get them to do so. I have no idea how to do this, but I agree that they should; if anyone from these trials wants to get in touch with me and talk about it and I would be interested in hearing what’s going on.

4: Substack asks me to let you all know that they now have an app, available on iOS and Android.

5: I got to talk to Daniel Ingram (Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha, etc) last week. He mentions that his Emergent Phenomenology Research Consortium - intended to help investigate phenomena usually considered “spiritual”/”psychedelic”/”mystical” like meditation and enlightenment, and to help health care workers better understand medical/psychiatric issues related to them - is going well but needs funding. Go here to learn more about how to help. They are also interested in connecting with meditators, researchers, and medical practitioners interested in their mission - see here for more.

6: Thanks to everyone who showed up to the LA meetup yesterday. San Diego meetup still scheduled for today, hope to see you there! Sorry that I am probably very rude and keep breaking off conversations halfway through because I have more people I need to talk to.

7: Misha Saul, who won the Readers’ Choice in last year’s Book Review Contest for his Disunited Nations and Dawn Of Eurasia review, has a Substack, Kvetch, with posts like The Heroes We’re Allowed, Why Practice Judaism, and The Enigma Of Clarence Thomas. Check it out!