All of aaronhamlin's Comments + Replies

Ethical Implications of AI in Military Operations: A Look at Project Nimbus
 

Recently, 'Democracy Now' highlighted Google’s involvement in Project Nimbus, a $1.2 billion initiative to provide cloud computing services to the Israeli government, including military applications. Google employees have raised concerns about the use of AI in creating 'kill lists' with minimal human oversight, as well as the usage of Google Photos to identify and detain individuals. This raises ethical questions about the role of AI in warfare and surveillance.

Despite a sit-i... (read more)

The funding to gather the signatures wasn't there. The main thing is just money and that tends to be why Irv campaigns take off instead. Money. Happy to talk with folks about supporting specific campaigns. Feel free to reach out.

While I support approval voting and election reform, I unfortunately can no longer personally recommend funding for this organization.

Note that funding was not sufficient to be able to move forward for this campaign. Feel free to reach out to me for other statewide funding opportunities.

The implementation keeps the primaries throughout the state as-is.

Right now, Missouri's primaries are "open" in the sense that you must vote within a party, but you can choose which party at any time. This would stay the same, but in both the primary and general, approval voting would be used. The campaign chose this system-wide change as the easiest option.

Additionally, approval voting would allow for independents to be viable candidates in the general.

Adding the link to CES was meant as a way of showing the need, but I don't think it was taken that way. Removing to keep the focus on the poster's idea and avoid my appearance of self promotion.

I consistently recommend Fidelity to others when talking about DAFs. Here's an article I did on DAFs.

Why Fidelity Charitable?

1. They're the largest DAF in the world and have efficient internal processes. They approve pretty much everything and if it's new or controversial to them, they get back to you quickly. 
2. They make direct transfers to the charity's bank account. You don't want some check just flying around. Many banks send off paper checks. No need for that nonsense.
3. They also handle cryptocurrency, which is nice. There may be some extra paperwork, b

If you like, I talk with lots of folks on technical aspects of giving, particularly as it also relates to balancing practical considerations like retirement. Feel free to message me.

You can also check out a number of essays I've written on this topic: https://www.aaronhamlin.com/articles/#philanthropy

I know our team isn't super excited by this switch by Every.org. Will be interesting to see how it goes.

Hi Adam,

I think your response fairly addresses the concerns I initially raised, and I appreciate your effort there. Thank you for the delicate response.

"I am skeptical whether CES will be able to have much influence at the federal level . . ."

It's worth mentioning that CES highlighted that approval voting was able to be used for US House, US Senate, Presidential general, and Presidential Primaries with state-wide ballot initiatives. This information seems to be missing in the write-up and instead states that it doesn't influence Federal elections. 

The write-up also seems to portray local-level reform is CES' only goal. Again. we provided feedback on this issue. We also corrected the review on the cos... (read more)

Within a week would be best as the opening closes within a few weeks.

We're hiring at the moment at The Center for Election Science for an operations director. We are open to EA and non EA applicants alike. We'd like to be able to pay more than $65K with a larger budget but we provide good benefits and are transparent. We are constantly trying to improve our process. If you have any feedback, feel free to share.

https://electionscience.org/ces-updates/were-hiring-a-director-of-operations-and-outreach/

I feel like this comment falls in this category:

"Q: I heard there was this thing about approval voting that wasn’t so good or that another voting method was better. Also, don’t forget about Arrow’s Theorem.

A: All voting methods have quirks, but we maintain that the quirks of approval voting are comparatively mild compared to the alternatives. You can see this article where we go into all the details about approval voting critiques. Also, I talked with Kenneth Arrow personally for an hour, and he said that our choose-one voting method was bad. Really."

I put... (read more)

Thanks for all you've done for the forum, Aaron! It was a challenging assignment to say the least. And a personal thank you for your feedback on some of my not-so-short essays! Best of luck on your new path. I'll be cheering you on.

Nice find, and thank you for sharing! I can verify that it worked quickly.

Useful for: Anyone who is required to show COVID Day 2 testing verification for their flight to the UK from the US (or other "non-red" countries).

Getting my ticket through British Airways automatically sent me through a confirmation process for a "Health Passenger Locator Form." Part of this requirement is for booking a COVID test prior to arrival in London (but actually done in London). The form actually doesn't let you proceed until 48 hours prior to your arrival in London, so this information may be helpful for those approaching that window.

There is a w... (read more)

One idea may be predictors of successful fundraising (ex// sector, revenue source, revenue distribution)
 

Do you see existential risks being mitigated without (1) strong governmental policy on those issue areas and (2) the ability for those policies to be sustained over a long time scale?

Follow-ups if yes:
1. How urgent is having a system where those governmental policies can reliably take hold?
2. Which country or countries should be prioritized?

Follow-up if no:
1. What would you recommend we focus on alongside or instead of governmental policy changes?

If an applicant has a strong stats and data analysis background, I would still encourage them to apply. It can sometimes be hard to check off every single box. Either way, please share with your network as well. Thanks!

I know it's a struggle to balance polishing and publishing. I find it challenging to balance myself. But I'd love to read your post when you have it up all the way.  I think a lot of us are curious about the interaction between longtermism, immediacy, and philanthropic investment.

I'm also a heavy sympathizer towards longtermism. But I don't know that the dilemma needs to be framed as an either/or. Many of the endeavors I've personally gotten behind—bringing new reversible male contraceptives to market and fundamentally improving elections—impact the short-to-mid-term future as well as the long-term future. 

That's because these interventions have the ability to have a positive impact now, plus their staying power impacts the future. That contrasts with interventions that deal with consumables or models where you have to keep ad... (read more)

We may have a campaign in 2021 (our initial play is riskier here), but we can't say yet for sure. We have other cities lined up for 2022. What I can say is all the cities we have in mind are over 750,000 people and are all very well known. We've laid out a strategic plan involving polling and legal analysis to factor in where to prioritize given our available funding. We're working for a surprise win in 2021 to excite our funders.

Thanks! You're right. There's so much to be said for making an approach as simple as possible.

Thanks! We look forward to continuing our impact. I'm always impressed with our team and what we're able to do with our resources.

This is really good news and reduces the barrier to utilize a great giving tool. Thanks so much for sharing this!

Sometimes membership dues can be deductable with a nonprofit but normally not in exchange for a service. For example, you could likely deduct ACLU membership dues. But they're not requiring membership in exchange for a service. I'd find the Alcor deduction much more questionable given that the only folks who get memberships are the ones who are being cryopreserved.

This is actually a more complicated response. One of my next essays will be on this topic, so thanks for asking!

Congrats on your giving! I would maybe add a note of caution if you were anticipating deducting fees to Alcor on your taxes. Even though they're a c3, they're providing a service to you. An analogy would be deducting fees for a YMCA gym membership, which is also not tax deductible.

I also say this being an Alcor member myself. Also, here's a resource on charitable giving and taxes I put together that may be useful: https://medium.com/@aaronhamlin/your-guide-to-charitable-giving-and-taxes-a7c0f44c922

Note that I don't count my payments for membership/cryopreservation towards my giving.

It's interesting that you were working on this as this exact issue came up during a project I was working on with Dan Hageman on directing folks to EA-aligned charities for employer gift matching. You can see the criteria that we set, though we don't have a more exhaustive list that you're attempting.
https://www.matchformore.org/where-should-i-give

Would you be able to add The Center for Election Science? We would fall under Far Future or Other, though preferably Far Future.

The Center for Election Science (CES) - Empowers voters through voting methods that strengthen democracy. CES accomplishes its mission through research and collaborating to pass ballot initiatives for approval voting. CES maintains that approval voting elects more consensus-style candidates and is more likely to maintain governmental stability over a long time frame in addition to providing near-term benefit.

Thanks!

Naturally, as the ED for CES, this is my favorite idea!

This is a good suggestion, one I'll keep in mind as I read posts that I find valuable. As someone who appreciates how hard it is to write a complex essay, I can say that it's encouraging to see positive responses alongside critiques. Positive responses register more clearly than an upvote and often include useful information as well.

Thanks for sharing, and I like the easy-to-read format of this post! As a reminder for those considering giving that under the CARES Act (this year only) if you're in the US and don't itemize, you can make up to a $300 above-the-line deduction for cash-only charitable donations.

I'm liking LEEP & Giving Green in particular, but I'm always excited by the charities that Charity Entrepreneurship puts out.

Resources for those thinking of giving below:

CARES Act Details: https://medium.com/@aaronhamlin/a-donors-guide-to-the-cares-act-d07c7db6a5d9

Tax Efficiency & Giving:  https://medium.com/@aaronhamlin/your-guide-to-charitable-giving-and-taxes-a7c0f44c922

I've written an entire essay outlining how charitable giving and taxes work. You may find that helpful: https://medium.com/@aaronhamlin/your-guide-to-charitable-giving-and-taxes-a7c0f44c922

This is a good point! Katie very likely was considering that and right on target.

As someone who started a nonprofit to speed up pharmaceutical drug development, this quote rings very true:

"The amount of money you need to develop these technologies at the early stages is much less than what you need at the later stages, but obtaining money for the later stages, like clinical trials, is much easier because much of the de-risking has already happened. Since philanthropic money is only needed at the early stages, the answer to that question is a relatively tiny amount of money: 500 millions or even 250 millions over a period of 10 years, w

Disclaimer: I'm the executive director for The Center for Election Science.

There’s some good stuff in this post.

Excessive political polarisation, especially party polarisation in the US, makes it harder to reach consensus or a fair compromise, and undermines trust in public institutions. Efforts to avoid harmful long-term dynamics, and to strengthen democratic governance, are therefore of interest to effective altruists. One concrete lever is electoral reform.

Great stuff.

Still, I think the downsides of plurality voting outweigh its advantages,

Any new updates on sending me the old information? I pester others on giving publicly and want to be sure that I model well personally. I'm thinking of adding a section to my personal website about my current, past, and planned giving for accountability.

The poll included only those who intended to vote in the Democratic Primary.

It's very difficult to manage volunteers in this way, particularly given our small staff size. We tend to contract polling out. That said, it takes some expertise to sort through the data. Having staff for research would help us dramatically in both evaluating voting methods and measuring progress within cities that we've won in.

Caucus voting still has vote splitting as voters aren't able to support multiple candidates simultaneously. With approval voting, you can support multiple candidates simultaneously. We haven't analyzed caucus voting. We did do this poll, however, on the democratic primaries: https://www.electionscience.org/press-releases/new-poll-74-of-democratic-primary-voters-would-support-warren-for-president/

I'd like to see us do much more research and evaluation, but we currently don't have it in our budget to hire a Director of Research and support staff.

Hi Larks,

On the moderate component, it's important to note a couple things: (1) moderate can change depending on what the population is and (2) sometimes we get a distorted view of what moderate is through the media.

Here, we're looking at a subgroup—people registered as democrats. So the population is a bit different. One of the platforms that Warren and Sanders are similar on that separate them from Biden is Medicare for All. It tends to poll rather well, particularly among democrats despite it being considered more extreme by the media.

O... (read more)

Replied at the bottom by accident. Starts with, "Hi, Adam."

Hi Adam,

Q: How would we know approval voting would give better policies? Why would the policies be good? And how do we know the policies would be good rather than merely popular?

A: I'm combining these ideas I pulled out because of their similarity. Approval voting tends to pull out the middle viewpoint (whatever that is for a particular electorate). And because viability is not an issue to gain initial support, it can provide a ramp for new ideas.

Is it possible that the popular opinion is bad? It sure is. But for this to be a real worry under approval... (read more)