Is there a safe way to ask dumb or potentially infohazardous questions?
If you're not an expert in a field and are unsure whether your question could be
hazardous or not, where do you go?
Perhaps I am being too security minded, but I feel like typing questions into a
search engine or chatbot or publicly posting does not always seem like a good
idea.
I often sit on questions or ideas related to potential threats. I have no idea
whether or not my questions/ thoughts are really dumb or whether some might be
useful to existing efforts. I wonder if others experience this as well. Some of
my thoughts or questions have been in relation to AI, supply chains, computer
science, energy utilization, infrastructure (by location and by industry),
intersectional risk (e.g. climate, nuclear, +), blockchain, telecommunication,
hardware, natural resources, security (infosecurity, cybersecurity, hardware
security, etc.), electronics (big and small), public messaging/communication/PR.
I would really appreciate advice. If others have similar concerns, please upvote
or pipe in, as it's possible that this is a problem that gets in the way with
working on important problems and potentially could be turned into an
opportunity.
Hey guys! I work in Politics and Economic Policy here in London. I’m going to
San Fran for the first time ever - where are the best places to go and who are
some great people to meet?
Thanks in advance!
Daylight Savings Time Fix: The real problem is losing the hour of sleep in the
spring. The solution is to set clocks back an hour in Fall, and move them
forward by 40 seconds everyday for 90 days in spring. No one is going to miss 40
seconds of sleep. Most clocks are digital and set themselves, so you don't need
adjust them and you won't notice anything in spring.
I've been reading a few academic papers on my "to-read" list
[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1BJMYZ37XvLuqrEuW9UBO3EWZ2UkyUxfP7bDneKg2tyE/edit?usp=sharing],
and The Crisis of Confidence in Research Findings in Psychology: Is Lack of
Replication the Real Problem? Or Is It Something Else?
[https://psycnet.apa.org/fulltext/2016-28881-001.html] has a section that made
me think about epistemics, knowledge, and how we try to make the world a better
place. I'll include the exact quote below, but my rough summary of it would be
that multiple studies found no relationship between the presence or absence of
highway shoulders [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoulder_(road)] and
accidents/deaths, and thus they weren't built. Unfortunately, none of the
studies had sufficient statistical power, and thus the conclusions drawn were
inaccurate. I suppose that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence might
be somewhat relevant here. Lo and behold, later on a meta-analysis was done,
finding that having highway shoulders reduced accidents/deaths. So my
understanding is that inaccurate knowledge (shoulders don't help) led to choices
(don't build shoulders) that led to accidents/deaths that wouldn't otherwise
have happened.
I'm wondering if there are other areas of life that we can find facing similar
issues. These wouldn't necessarily be new cause areas, but the general idea of
identify an area that involves life/death decisions, and then either make sure
the knowledge is accurate or attempt to bring accurate knowledge to the
decision-makers would be incredibly helpful. Hard though. Probably not very
tractable.
For anyone curious, here is the relevant excerpt that prompted my musings:
EDIT: Biden Backs $8 Billion Alaska Oil Project
[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-03-13/biden-backs-giant-alaska-oil-project-despite-climate-peril].
I don't know why someone gave this shortform an immediate -9 downvote, but for
those EAs that still care about climate change, thank you.
A massive and controversial new oil production project in Alaska is under review
by the US Department of the Interior.
ConocoPhillips' massive Willow Project would be a climate disaster, locking in
at least 30 years of fossil fuel production on sensitive Arctic ecosystems near
Indigenous communities. It would unleash high levels of pollution - roughly the
equivalent of 66-76 coal plants worth of carbon to the air - and directly
undermine President Biden's climate goals.
The Biden administration has the power to stop this massive fossil fuel
development. Click here to send them a letter (2 minutes).
[https://go.acespace.org/page/121441]
The policy topic covers improving specific policies and governing institutions in countries and at the international level.