Once again I have been reading Robin Hanson on cultural adaptation and cultural drift. I am sympathetic to futarchy, and he invented it. I am less sympathetic to many of his proposed solutions to fix cultural drift.

In a blog post from earlier this month, Hanson puts forward the idea of the “ancestor test” – would our ancestors have been persuaded to accept certain changes in order to promote their cultural values? I think Hanson’s idea is that sticking to the ancestor test will reduce cultural drift and help keep the ship of society sailing smoothly into the future.

My ancestors were fairly intellectual and often bucked the trends of their day to pursue their goals. It’s part of the reason why I am alive and blogging and having hot takes today.