Following JoshuaZ, I also don’t think this remark should stand unchallenged.
Why shouldn’t he be attacking his cancer in 30 ways at the same time?
Off-target effects, which are difficult to predict even for a single, well-understood drug. Also, the CYPs in your liver can turn a safe drug into a much scarier metabolite. And the drugs themselves can also modify the activity of the CYPs. Combined with dynamic dosing (“keep doubling the dose until the patient feels side effects”) the blood levels of the 30 drugs will be all over the place.
But if you do this for enough billionaires, the common elements in the problem will start repeating and the researchers will learn a repertoire of common hacks.
What are the common elements present when the patient has been dosed with varying amounts of 30 different drugs? If the cancer is cured, how should the credit be split among the teams? If the patient dies, who gets the blame?
The anti-quackery property of the current research regime is not just to prevent patients from being hoodwinked. It’s epistemic hygiene to keep the researchers from fooling themselves into thinking they’re helping when they’re really doing nothing or causing active harm.
I was talking about the bolded part (though I happen to approve of the text that follows it too) when I said that he is of course right. Our dealings with medicine seem tainted by an irrational risk aversion.
Following JoshuaZ, I also don’t think this remark should stand unchallenged.
Off-target effects, which are difficult to predict even for a single, well-understood drug. Also, the CYPs in your liver can turn a safe drug into a much scarier metabolite. And the drugs themselves can also modify the activity of the CYPs. Combined with dynamic dosing (“keep doubling the dose until the patient feels side effects”) the blood levels of the 30 drugs will be all over the place.
What are the common elements present when the patient has been dosed with varying amounts of 30 different drugs? If the cancer is cured, how should the credit be split among the teams? If the patient dies, who gets the blame?
The anti-quackery property of the current research regime is not just to prevent patients from being hoodwinked. It’s epistemic hygiene to keep the researchers from fooling themselves into thinking they’re helping when they’re really doing nothing or causing active harm.
I was talking about the bolded part (though I happen to approve of the text that follows it too) when I said that he is of course right. Our dealings with medicine seem tainted by an irrational risk aversion.
Fair enough. Only my last point sort of engages with the bolded text.
I think there are much sounder ways to buy fewer undertreatment deaths from those extra sigmas of confidence than the plan that Moldbug proposes.