Psychotropic Base Rates: The Argument From Antibiotics

A short, sharp piece: antibiotics/antiprotozoals keep turning out to have psychiatric effects (minocycline for schizophrenia, the antitubercular iproniazid becoming the first antidepressant, cycloserine speeding fear-extinction, mefloquine's weird effects). Since these drugs are essentially 'random' with respect to psychiatry, the recurring hits imply the base rate of arbitrary chemicals being psychoactive is higher than we assume — a nice corrective to the 'most chemicals aren't active medications' prior. Slight in length but a genuinely thought-provoking base-rate insight.

Quality 63 · Strong. Strong (63): a real, memorable insight (psychiatric base rates are higher than intuition suggests) delivered economically; modest in length/scope, so lower-Strong.

Claude’s paradigm shift 44 · Moderate. Moderate (44): a fresh little reframe of drug-discovery priors; limited independent novelty.

Real-world impact 2 · Minor. Minor-plus (2): within-blog/niche psychopharmacology interest; no durable footprint.