On Long-term Thinking

Most of our decisions optimize for the short term. Quarterly earnings. Election cycles. Next week’s deadline. This is understandable—short-term problems are concrete and urgent, while long-term problems feel abstract.

But the most important decisions are long-term ones.

The Case for Long-term Thinking

Compound Effects

Small improvements compound over time. A 1% improvement per year becomes a 2.7x improvement over 100 years. Most progress—scientific, technological, social—comes from sustained effort across generations.

The cathedrals of medieval Europe took centuries to build. Their builders knew they wouldn’t see the finished work.

Existential Risks

Some risks threaten humanity’s entire future:

• Nuclear war
• Pandemics (natural or engineered)
• Climate change
• Artificial intelligence risks
• Unknown unknowns

A 1% annual risk of extinction gives humanity only 100 years in expectation. These risks demand long-term attention.

Moral Patients in the Future

If future people matter morally—and why wouldn’t they?—then the long-term future matters enormously. In expectation, most humans who will ever exist haven’t been born yet.

Obstacles to Long-term Thinking

Hyperbolic Discounting

Humans psychologically discount the future more than is rational. We prefer $100 today over $110 next week, but $110 in a year over $100 in 51 weeks. This inconsistency biases us toward short-term choices.

Institutional Incentives

• Democracies operate on 2-4 year cycles
• Corporations report quarterly earnings
• Academia evaluates based on recent publications
• Media focuses on daily news

Our institutions aren’t built for long-term planning.

Uncertainty

The future is uncertain. Why plan for something that might not happen? This reasoning is often an excuse. We can make probabilistic plans even under uncertainty.

Cultivating Long-term Thinking

Institutions

Some institutions maintain long-term perspectives:

• Universities: Centuries-old institutions pursuing knowledge
• The Long Now Foundation: Building a 10,000-year clock
• Sovereign wealth funds: Managing wealth across generations
• Constitutional courts: Interpreting documents across centuries

We need more such institutions.

Practices

Individuals can cultivate long-term thinking:

• Write for the future: Create things that will last
• Plant trees: Literal and metaphorical
• Maintain infrastructure: Fix things before they break
• Teach: Pass knowledge to the next generation

Stories

We need narratives that span centuries. Science fiction, long-term history, and multigenerational sagas help us imagine extended timescales.

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See also: Digital Gardens, Notes on Scientific Method