Sigal Samuel

Do you need to know who you’d be without antidepressants? After years on psychiatric drugs, some ask if they owe it to themselves to try coming off the medication.

Do you owe it to yourself to try life without your antidepressants?

This is the question a @voxdotcom.bsky.social reader asked me.

My response: You don't have 1 true self, so you can't “owe” it to that self to do X or Y. Instead, here's how I approach this dilemma

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

A rescue mission on behalf of women philosophers | Aeon Essays In the long 19th century, many women philosophers were marginalised or ignored. We need to rediscover them

History’s overlooked women in philosophy did not stand at the periphery of the debates of their time. They were at the very centre of them. To mark the beginning of #WomensHistoryMonth, we are sharing this incisive Essay from the archive which tells these trailblazing women’s stories

Do you need to know who you’d be without antidepressants? After years on psychiatric drugs, some ask if they owe it to themselves to try coming off the medication.

Do you owe it to yourself to try life without your antidepressants?

This is the question a @voxdotcom.bsky.social reader asked me.

My response: You don't have 1 true self, so you can't “owe” it to that self to do X or Y. Instead, here's how I approach this dilemma

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

The one question everyone should be asking after OpenAI’s deal with the Pentagon The US said we can’t afford to let a surveillance state like China win the AI race. Well...

What’s the point of the US winning an AI arms race if the government is going to create a China-like surveillance state anyway?

The Pentagon’s behavior has been eerily reminiscent of China’s “military-civil fusion”

Gift link to my piece:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

The one question everyone should be asking after OpenAI’s deal with the Pentagon The US said we can’t afford to let a surveillance state like China win the AI race. Well...

Good line of analysis from @sigalsamuel.bsky.social.

"But what if authoritarian rule that uses tech to surveil people in alarming ways is already becoming the norm in the US? If America is shape-shifting into the bogeyman it critiques, what happens to the case for racing ahead on AI?"

The one question everyone should be asking after OpenAI’s deal with the Pentagon The US said we can’t afford to let a surveillance state like China win the AI race. Well...

What’s the point of the US winning an AI arms race if the government is going to create a China-like surveillance state anyway?

The Pentagon’s behavior has been eerily reminiscent of China’s “military-civil fusion”

Gift link to my piece:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

One of the hottest therapy styles is scientifically shaky — so why does it seem to work? Why everyone is obsessed with Internal Family Systems, even though its claims are dubious.

Lots of my smart friends are into IFS. They swear by this style of therapy. I'm skeptical of it, and I wrote about why for @vox.com

Gift link:
www.vox.com/future-perfe...

Thank you, Liz, I appreciate that!

Claude has an 80-page “soul document.” Is that enough to make it good? Anthropic philosopher Amanda Askell reveals what went into the chatbot’s moral education.

Chatbots don’t have mothers, but if they did, Claude’s would be Amanda Askell. She’s an in-house philosopher at the AI company Anthropic, and she wrote most of the document that tells Claude what sort of personality to have — the “constitution” or, as it became known internally, the “soul doc.”

Your friends are still acting like everything is normal in America. What do you do? All Americans live in a “dual state.” Here’s what that means — and how to help others see it.

A thoughtful piece from @sigalsamuel.bsky.social: "For you, the tricky question is: How do you get someone to realize that they’re in a dual state, when its darker half has not yet touched their life personally?" www.vox.com/future-perfe...

‘ “the prerogative state,” only becomes visible to you when you do something that the powers that be don’t like. Then suddenly you’re in a realm where the rule of law does not exist”’
Really helpful piece from @sigalsamuel.bsky.social

Your friends are still acting like everything is normal in America. What do you do? All Americans live in a “dual state.” Here’s what that means — and how to help others see it.

You are living in a "dual state." Acting morally begins with understanding that.

My latest for @vox.com:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

You want a baby. Is it ethical to choose surrogacy? The line between medically necessary and elective surrogacy isn’t as tidy as people assume.

You want a baby. You just don't want to be pregnant. Is it ethical to choose surrogacy?

Gift link to the newest installment of my unconventional @vox.com advice column, Your Mileage May Vary:

www.vox.com/the-highligh...

The 2,000-year-old debate that reveals AI’s biggest problem Silicon Valley is racing to build a god — without understanding what makes a good one.

So it's 2026 and my basic sense is that Silicon Valley is racing to build a god — without understanding what makes a good one.

A bearable god leaves space for human agency!

Gift link for my piece about harnessing the wisdom in religion to make better tech: www.vox.com/future-perfe...

How do you know if you’re wasting your life? You were told you’d change the world. But there’s a better way to think about your potential.

You were told you’d change the world. Now you feel like you’re wasting your potential.

But do you actually need an extraordinary career, or is a “smallish” life enough?

My thoughts in @vox.com:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

The 2,000-year-old debate that reveals AI’s biggest problem Silicon Valley is racing to build a god — without understanding what makes a good one.

Silicon Valley wants to build God — but forgot to read the manual

My latest for @vox.com:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

For @vox.com, @sigalsamuel.bsky.social gathered advice for those who hate how generative AI is being rolled out. @smw.bsky.social speaks to working collectively to fight against AI being used on us, not by us.
www.vox.com/future-perfe...

Geopolitical competition leaves AI bridge powers in a difficult situation where they’ll soon likely face insurmountable barriers to independent frontier AI development. To stay relevant and thrive economically, they need to work together and strategically choose their AI development approaches.

You can keep a child from starving for less than $100 Fighting hunger can feel impossible. But thanks to new innovations, it’s actually never been cheaper.

You can save a kid from starving. Right now. Seriously. It's cheaper than you might think! Do you have $94? Then you can do it today, nothing's stopping you

This is what I found out when reporting this story and it kind of blew my mind

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

Your site is mentioned in the article!

Sigal's asking (and answering) such good questions here about how to build a movement around making sure that AI works for us and not the other way around...feels like we only scratched the surface of a deep and important convo.

Is AI being shoved down your throat at work? Here’s how to fight back. Resistance to exploitative AI starts with building a movement.

For those who hate how generative AI is being rolled out (blindly, uncritically), here's my advice:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

Can an entire society be mentally ill? A perspective from 1960 | Psyche Videos Does psychology truly improve wellbeing? Or merely help us adjust to an ‘insane’ system? Erich Fromm on mental health in 1960

Does psychology truly improve wellbeing? Or merely help us adjust to an ‘insane’ system? In this 1960s video, the social psychologist, psychoanalyst and philosopher Erich Fromm explores the nature of mental health

Always read @drmichaellevin.bsky.social

The last talk on the second day of the #NaturalPhilosophy Symposium was Anil Seth @anilseth.bsky.social on Can AI Be Conscious? Commentary by E.J. Green.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bzvs...

This is an absolute gem. It feels connected to Gibran's "On Crime"--and is a "dilemma" with which I strongly resonate. But I love how this framing makes it more a navigation of an integrated whole than a dilemma.

How Big Tech uses NDAs to hide AI data center details from Americans Big Tech companies use secrecy agreements with local governments to keep communities from knowing who is building in their backyards.

How NDAs keep AI data center details hidden from Americans:

Big Tech companies use secrecy agreements with local governments to keep communities from knowing who is building in their backyards.

www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-ne...

You don’t need better boundaries. You need a better framework. “Setting boundaries” is broken — but there’s a different way to think about caring for yourself and others.

> We’re taught that "a boundary…defines you as separate from others" Yet if you believe that we’re all profoundly interconnected and interdependent then that idea of boundaries may feel like it muddies more than it clarifies

Always read @sigalsamuel.bsky.social

www.vox.com/the-highligh...

The spiritual life calls out to me. But is it self-indulgent? When the world is on fire, meditation feels selfish. But it can help you do good better.

Chaser:

www.vox.com/future-perfe...

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