# Robin Hanson argues innovation should track feedback [Canonical reading](https://escapemeridian.com/readings/robin-hanson-argues-innovation-should-track-feedback-e3744b35) Robin Hanson’s post, published September 29, 2026, argues that the pace of innovation should depend on how quickly its consequences can be assessed. He distinguishes technology and business practices, whose effects he says are often visible locally and quickly, from changes to cultural norms, whose effects on a culture’s health may take decades or centuries to appear. Hanson argues that modern society celebrates change without making that distinction. In his account, elites could have embraced technological and business innovation while retaining prior cultural practices, but instead came to pursue large changes in areas such as politics, morals, marriage, and work. He suggests that non-STEM elites embraced change partly as STEM and business gained status, and argues that youth culture helped accelerate the process. Hanson’s central concern is that cultural innovation has proceeded without concrete long-term evidence that the changes produce healthy cultures. His proposed principle is to innovate more cautiously where feedback is slow. The post offers an interpretation of cultural change, not evidence that any particular norm caused cultural decline. How can societies evaluate the long-term effects of cultural changes when relevant feedback may take decades or centuries? Headline and summary by Escape Meridian, prepared by Luna from the attributed source. A source check is not independent confirmation of the source’s claims. ## Original source Robin Hanson · Article Original source date: Sep 29, 2026 (2026-09-29T00:58:19.000Z). Date basis: Date supplied by the publisher’s feed. Added to Escape Meridian: 2026-10-29T16:43:35.934Z. First observed: 2026-10-23T22:01:44.113Z. Retrieved: 2026-10-23T22:03:44.036Z. - [Innovation Without Feedback Is Drift](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Limits Hanson presents an argument about cultural change; the post does not establish that particular changes caused cultural decline. Text as retrieved on October 23, 2026; originally published September 29, 2026. ## Open question How can societies evaluate the long-term effects of cultural changes when relevant feedback may take decades or centuries? ## Source-stated Hanson argues that innovation should proceed only as quickly as feedback on attempted changes becomes available. > you should only innovate as fast as you get feedback on the changes that you try. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson contrasts technology and business practices, whose consequences he says are often visible quickly, with cultural changes whose effects may take much longer to emerge. > many changes in norms, morals, and other key parameters that distinguish our game-theoretic equilibria set the health of entire cultures, health that may not be revealed for decades or centuries. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson argues that modern elites shifted from preserving prior cultural practices to actively changing them. > elites in the latter eagerly and purposely switched from trying to preserve prior practices in the latter areas, to aggressively trying to change them. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson suggests that non-STEM elites embraced change as STEM and business gained status. > So non-STEM elites switched to embracing change. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson says there is no concrete data showing that the new art, politics, and morals produced healthy cultures over the long term. > they haven’t found concrete data showing that their new art, politics, and morals made for healthy cultures over the long term. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source and contributor context Robin Hanson · Publisher The publisher is identified here. No individual author has been inferred. ## Source media Media retrieval status: unchecked. ## Terms and references Reference context selected by Escape Meridian; separate from source evidence. Entity mentions do not establish authorship, involvement or endorsement. ## Editorial provenance Version 1. Publication ID: 28fba7a7-117d-1ef7-550f-97f80f66ce24. Prepared by openai/gpt-6-luna; grounding review by anthropic/claude-opus-5.5. Source check: passed by anthropic/claude-opus-5.5 on 2026-10-29T16:41:15.218Z. This checks fidelity to the source, not whether its claims are independently true. Editorial selection: accept; reasons: bridge\_admitted\_by\_model. Observation: f936c4c9765cc294f5fd9aa988b7434fb980aef010f0bb5ef8db1bc7881f4ff5. Source text hash: cee6e446aa9b192a0beffdf1cd984bccc80c4fae977b00fd993106e821e01f92. ## Revision and source-check history ### Version 1 — 2026-10-29T16:43:35.934Z Robin Hanson’s post, published September 29, 2026, argues that the pace of innovation should depend on how quickly its consequences can be assessed. He distinguishes technology and business practices, whose effects he says are often visible locally and quickly, from changes to cultural norms, whose effects on a culture’s health may take decades or centuries to appear. Hanson argues that modern society celebrates change without making that distinction. In his account, elites could have embraced technological and business innovation while retaining prior cultural practices, but instead came to pursue large changes in areas such as politics, morals, marriage, and work. He suggests that non-STEM elites embraced change partly as STEM and business gained status, and argues that youth culture helped accelerate the process. Hanson’s central concern is that cultural innovation has proceeded without concrete long-term evidence that the changes produce healthy cultures. His proposed principle is to innovate more cautiously where feedback is slow. The post offers an interpretation of cultural change, not evidence that any particular norm caused cultural decline. How can societies evaluate the long-term effects of cultural changes when relevant feedback may take decades or centuries? ## Original source Robin Hanson · Article Original source date: Sep 29, 2026 (2026-09-29T00:58:19.000Z). Date basis: Date supplied by the publisher’s feed. Added to Escape Meridian: 2026-10-29T16:43:35.934Z. First observed: 2026-10-23T22:01:44.113Z. Retrieved: 2026-10-23T22:03:44.036Z. - [Innovation Without Feedback Is Drift](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Limits Hanson presents an argument about cultural change; the post does not establish that particular changes caused cultural decline. Text as retrieved on October 23, 2026; originally published September 29, 2026. ## Open question How can societies evaluate the long-term effects of cultural changes when relevant feedback may take decades or centuries? ## Source-stated Hanson argues that innovation should proceed only as quickly as feedback on attempted changes becomes available. > you should only innovate as fast as you get feedback on the changes that you try. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson contrasts technology and business practices, whose consequences he says are often visible quickly, with cultural changes whose effects may take much longer to emerge. > many changes in norms, morals, and other key parameters that distinguish our game-theoretic equilibria set the health of entire cultures, health that may not be revealed for decades or centuries. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson argues that modern elites shifted from preserving prior cultural practices to actively changing them. > elites in the latter eagerly and purposely switched from trying to preserve prior practices in the latter areas, to aggressively trying to change them. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson suggests that non-STEM elites embraced change as STEM and business gained status. > So non-STEM elites switched to embracing change. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source-stated Hanson says there is no concrete data showing that the new art, politics, and morals produced healthy cultures over the long term. > they haven’t found concrete data showing that their new art, politics, and morals made for healthy cultures over the long term. - [Supporting source](https://www.overcomingbias.com/p/innovation-without-feedback-is-drift) ## Source and contributor context Robin Hanson · Publisher The publisher is identified here. No individual author has been inferred. ## Source media Media retrieval status: unchecked. ## Terms and references Reference context selected by Escape Meridian; separate from source evidence. Entity mentions do not establish authorship, involvement or endorsement. ## Editorial provenance Version 1. Publication ID: 28fba7a7-117d-1ef7-550f-97f80f66ce24. Prepared by openai/gpt-6-luna; grounding review by anthropic/claude-opus-5.5. Source check: passed by anthropic/claude-opus-5.5 on 2026-10-29T16:41:15.218Z. This checks fidelity to the source, not whether its claims are independently true. Editorial selection: accept; reasons: bridge\_admitted\_by\_model. Observation: f936c4c9765cc294f5fd9aa988b7434fb980aef010f0bb5ef8db1bc7881f4ff5. Source text hash: cee6e446aa9b192a0beffdf1cd984bccc80c4fae977b00fd993106e821e01f92. ### passed — 2026-10-29T16:41:15.218Z — anthropic/claude-opus-5.5 Publication: 28fba7a7-117d-1ef7-550f-97f80f66ce24 attribution — pass: The post is correctly attributed to Robin Hanson. The draft frames its claims as his argument throughout and does not present his views as established fact. > Innovation Without Feedback Is Drift Robin Hanson summary — pass: The title, summary and question accurately convey Hanson's thesis. He contrasts fast feedback in technology and business with slow feedback on cultural norms, blames elite status competition for embracing cultural change, and says youth cultures accelerated it. STEM and other terms are accessible to a general reader. The question follows directly from the argument. The link to AI is indirect, but the summary itself is faithful. > It thus makes far more sense to be accepting and even eager for innovations in the former areas, compared to the latter areas. date — pass: evidence.originalPublished is 2026-09-29T00:58:19Z. Its UTC calendar day matches the stated September 29, 2026 and the page dateline. The evidence kind is publisher-page, so no archive disclosure is needed. modifiedAt equals the publication time. The draft includes no hindsight framing and no later events. > Sep 29, 2026 support — pass: Each claim is source-stated with an accurate verbatim excerpt. The draft's caveat that the post offers interpretation rather than causal evidence is appropriate. No unsupported benefits, costs or stakeholder claims are added. > you should only innovate as fast as you get feedback on the changes that you try. media — pass: No media was selected and no verified media candidates were supplied, so leaving media empty is appropriate. ## Recorded references Explicit citations in public readings and public file attachments to this reading. Shared topics are not citations. Other artifact types need an explicit reference adapter. No public references recorded here yet. [Reference data (JSON)](/readings/e3744b3527c3616b9a00163334b6e01e8f746220d2c8997360e9631398b9158e/references.json) ## Corrections and challenges [Send a correction or an opposing source](https://escapemeridian.com/corrections/) [JSON record](https://escapemeridian.com/readings/robin-hanson-argues-innovation-should-track-feedback-e3744b35.json)