All of Patrick's Comments + Replies
One thing I'd like to highlight: our per-hour pre-tax profits were closer to $150–200/hour than the $500/hour claimed in the post's title. I think the main source of the discrepancy was that the author was significantly faster than us at finding and placing bets.
For my calculation, I factored in things such as trip planning and travel time (scaled by 50% because the trip included leisure activities), financial preparation, getting money out of accounts, taking screenshots of losses, filling out 2022 tax returns, filling out the spreadsheets where we tracke...
I emailed CEA with some questions about the LTFF and EAIF, and Michael Aird (MichaelA on the forum) responded about the EAIF. He said that I could post his email here. Some of the questions overlap with the contents of this AMA (among other things), but I included everything. My questions are formatted as quotes, and the unquoted passages below were written by Michael.
Here are some things I've heard about LTFF and EAIF (please correct any misapprehensions):
You can apply for a grant anytime, and a decision will be made within a few weeks.
Basically correct. ...
So I believe we're simply not judging more recent art works by the same standards, resulting in a huge bias towards older works.
Why is it wrong to credit past art for innovations that have since become commonplace? If a musician's innovations became widespread, I would count that as evidence of the musician's skill. Similarly, Euclid was a big deal even though there are millions of people who know more math today than he did.
...Beethoven is only noteworthy because his works are a cultural meme at this point - he was a great musician for his time, sure, b
One reason it might be a reductio ad absurdum is that it suggests that in an election in which supporters of one side were rational (and thus would not vote, since each of their votes would have a minuscule chance of mattering) and the others irrational (and would vote, undeterred by the small chance of their vote mattering), the irrational side would prevail.
If this is the claim that John G. Halstead is referring to, I regard it as a throwaway remark (it's only one sentence plus a citation):
For instance, a simple threshold or plausibility assessment could protect the field’s resources and attention from being directed towards highly improbable or fictional events.
I would've found it helpful if the post included a definition of TUA (as well as saying what what it stands for). Here's a relevant excerpt from the paper:
...The TUA [techno-utopian approach] is a cluster of ideas which make up the original paradigm within which the field of ERS [existential-risk studies] was founded. We understand it to be primarily based on three main pillars of belief: transhumanism, total utilitarianism and strong longtermism. More precisely: (1) the belief that a maximally technologically developed future could contain (and is defined
Re patient philanthropy funds: Spending money on research rather than giving money to a fund does seem more focused and efficient. I think there are limits to how much progress you can make with research (assuming that research hasn't ruled the idea out), so it does make sense to try creating such a fund at some point. Some issues would become apparent with even a toy fund (one with a minimal amount of capital produced as an exercise). A real fund that has millions of dollars would be a better test of the idea, but whether contributing to such a fund is a good use of money is less clear to me now.
In general, it kind of seems like the "point" of the lottery is to do something other than allocate to a capital allocator. The lottery is "meant" to minimise work on selecting a charity to give to, but if you're happy to give that work to another allocator I feel like it makes less sense?
When I entered the lottery, I hadn't given much thought to what I'd do if I won—I was convinced by the argument that giving to the lottery dominated giving to the LTFF (for example), since if I won the lottery I could just decide to give the money to the LTFF. I think...
velutvulpes, could you update the RSS link to point to https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1755269.rss? I'm working on migrating to a new podcast host (Buzzsprout). The old feed currently redirects there, but my understanding is that it will stop redirecting after I complete the migration.
This isn't your first EA podcast. This is not so much because the content is difficult, but because it has relatively low production value (it's just EA conference talks in podcast format). The 80,000 Hours Podcast, Hear This Idea, and The FLI Podcast are more entertaining and polished while still being similarly informative, and I'd recommend listening to those first.
I will primarily focus on The case for strong longtermism, listed as “draft status” on both Greaves and MacAskill’s personal websites as of November 23rd, 2020. It has generated quite a lot of conversation within the effective altruism (EA) community despite its status, including multiple podcast episodes on 80000 hours podcast (one, two, three), a dedicated a multi-million dollar fund listed on the EA website, numerous blog posts, and an active forum discussion.
"The Case for Strong Longtermism" is subtitled "GPI Working Paper No. 7-2019," which leads m...
On what principle is it that, when we see nothing but improvement behind us, we are to expect nothing but deterioration before us?
—Thomas Babington Macaulay
The good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view (if I may so say) of the Universe, than the good of any other; unless, that is, there are special grounds for believing that more good is likely to be realized in the one case than in the other.
—Henry Sidgwick
Pain is always new to the sufferer, but loses its originality for those around him.
—Alphonse Daudet
...A hum
On what principle is it that, when we see nothing but improvement behind us, we are to expect nothing but deterioration before us? —Thomas Babington Macaulay
The good of any one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view (if I may so say) of the Universe, than the good of any other; unless, that is, there are special grounds for believing that more good is likely to be realized in the one case than in the other. —Henry Sidgwick
Pain is always new to the sufferer, but loses its originality for those around him. —Alphonse Daudet
A human being i...
In addition to lowering the cost for readers, buying the rights to a book could allow certain improvements to be made.
The paperback version of Reasons and Persons is poorly typeset (the text is small and cramped) and unevenly printed (some parts are too light; others too dark). The form factor is close to that of a mass market paperback (short, narrow, and fat). The cover photo is bleak and blurry. These factors combine to make the book seem dated and unappealing.
On What Matters, a book with the same author and publisher, is a beautiful volume, and an exam
...I've looked a bit at DAFs but the fees look quite high and I wonder if I could assemble something better myself.
By "quite high," do you mean 0.6% per annum in addition to the mutual-fund expense ratio? That's the fee charged by Vanguard, Fidelity, and Charles Schwab on the first $500k. To me, the benefits a DAF offers seem worth the price:
- immediate tax-deductibility
- untaxed dividends and interest
- ease of granting (you don't have to coordinate with the recipient to transfer appreciated assets)
- pre-commitment (the money must go to a 501(c)(3) charity)
If you haven't read the article (as I hadn't, since I came by a direct link to this comment), you should know that there's exactly one sentence about algorithmic racial discrimination in the entire article. I was surprised that a single sentence (and one rather tangential to the article) generated this much discussion.
Whatever you think about the claim, it doesn't seem like a sufficient reason not to recommend the article as an introduction to the subject.
For people spending larger amounts, Citi Double Cash or Alliant Cashback Visa Signature are probably the best options. The Double Cash card has no annual fee and gives 2% back (assuming you pay off your credit-card bill in full). The Alliant card gives 3% cash back and waives the annual fee the first year, and gives 2.5% cash back and charges $99 in subsequent years. So you'd need to spend at least $20k per year for the Alliant card to be a better option in the long run.
Even with 2.5% cash back, it would be a better deal to send a check to the charity if t
...The Future of Life Institute Podcast has some episodes on the risks of climate change. The most relevant one is The Climate Crisis as an Existential Threat. There's also an ongoing series about global warming called Not Cool that has some episodes not yet listed on the FLI Web site.
A few years ago I lent a total of about $3k to two EAs.
The larger loan was to someone vouched for by a respected member of the community and was to help cover educational expenses. The person wasn't able to find a job, and I didn't get any money back. The smaller loan was not for educational expenses and went to someone not vouched for, and got I got about a third back.
Lending money to students may be a good idea. The standards of hits-based giving may be more relevant than the standards of finance, and a high default rate may be tolerable. I just want people to know that they may not get their money back.
The talks from EA Global 2018 in San Francisco have been available on YouTube for a few months. They're now also available in podcast format at EARadio . (The podcast is an aggregation of publicly available talks relevant to EA. It isn't affiliated with the CEA.) The EA Global London talks will be released over the next couple of weeks.
Subscription links:
I also admit that it isn't "free" to invest the money in bond, in that there's operational overhead involved, but with such a large amount of money held it seems worthwhile.
You said that the funds currently hold $1.1 million and that US Treasury bonds yield 1.7% a year. That's $18,700 a year in foregone revenue. In 80,000 Hours' survey of EA organizations, a new hire was seen as worth something in the neighborhood of a million dollars in forgone donations a year. So it's not surprising to me that the donations are held in cash—I could easily s...
Just a heads-up, many people aren't eligible to become kidney donors. Here are some common disqualifiers (at least in the US):
- smoking
- use of illegal drugs (including marijuana) within the past year or so
- regular use of medicines that may cause kidney damage (this includes common drugs like ibuprofen, aspirin, and naproxen)
- certain chronic health conditions, such as diabetes or high blood pressure
Criteria vary by transplant center, so if you're interested it's probably worth checking even if you match one of the things I listed. But don't get your hopes...
The EARadio podcast is back on iTunes. (The podcast is an aggregation of publicly available talks relevant to EA, such as those from EA Global.)
It had been delisted for the better part of a year, but I failed to noticed because I don't use iTunes. (The most likely reason for its delisting is that it didn't specify whether it contained explicit language, which is now an Apple requirement.)
Subscription links:
I wrote some code that had a bug. My understanding is that if you published an article, it would appear on the homepage, but if you clicked on the link, you'd get an error page (404 not found) instead of seeing the article. In addition, it wasn't clear that the article was being published, which resulted in some articles appearing multiple times.
I haven't yet had a chance to investigate the bug, but my changes were undone and the broken links deleted. Thanks to Peter Hurford, Ryan Carey, and Michael Webb for noticing and fixing the issue. And I'm sorry for introducing the bug.
I agree, and I imagine you can adjust your pledge. If you pledged 50% as a doctor and later decided to change to a lower-paying non-profit career, I doubt whether Giving What We Can would blackball you for adjusting your pledge to 10%.
If the US government were to get rid of the charitable tax deduction or to sharply raise taxes, I couldn't meet my pledge. But I don't think that I'd be a worse person than I would've been had I correctly forecast changes in tax policy. I would simply update my pledge with Giving What We Can and get on with life.
The Giving What We Can pledge doesn't make any mention of a time period (other than your working years) over which you must give the pledged percentage of your income:
For people earning a regular income, the Pledge commits you to giving at least 10% of your pre-tax income, until retirement, to the charities you believe will do the most good in the world.
If I were interpreting this as a legal contract, I would consider it fulfilled if someone donated nothing for their first forty working years and made it up by donating most of their salary in their las...
Another potential problem with a maximum-consumption pledge is that it acts as an effective 100% marginal tax rate, and so may reduce self-interested motivation for doing things that will increase one's salary.
I felt that the group photo was a waste of my time because I wasn't visible to the camera. But if I hadn't participated I suppose someone else might've gotten my bad spot.
This looks like an old post. I think it was originally published several months ago.
EDIT: I thought it had been published because I saw a draft of it in August, and most of the changes mentioned aren't recent. For example, the article says
The sidebar's display for meetups near you and recent posts was improved. For example, now the meetup names are displayed, whereas previously users just saw the address of the meetup.
But meetups have since been removed. (There is now only a link to an external page.) I thought maybe the article had somehow been republished owing to a bug in the forum software. But now I think its publication was just delayed.
The talks from EA Global are available in podcast format at EARadio (iTunes link). The YouTube videos seem to have disappeared, so this may be the easiest way to access the talks. Cheers!
Sure, that would be very helpful. Boris did that for a couple of other files. I'll upload any cleaned-up audio sent my way. New audio is also welcome!
E-mail is probably the best way to get in touch: pbrinichlanglois@gmail.com
And sorry for the delayed reply! I didn't see your comment.
80,000 Hours have only a few videos on their YouTube channel that're more than ten minutes long.
Is there anything you had in mind? I don't know of any other talks that are relevant and whose permissions would be easy to secure.
P.S. I just realized that the audio quality of Toby Ord's talk is very bad.
P.P.S. If anyone would like to take over this project, let me know.
But reforming the earned income tax credit and relaxing zoning laws would also both do a lot to help the poor in the US.
The link above didn't seem to have any proposals of how to reform the earned income tax credit. It argues for an alternative measure of poverty in the US.
Space limitations: http://lesswrong.com/lw/jxd/effective_altruism_summit_2014/apw3
This raises the question, Why not choose a larger space? Perhaps because of financial limitations.
Maybe they want an idea of how many people will attend. If people just needed to type in their names and e-mail addresses, it could be that a lot more people sign up than attend. Also, they might have space limitations, and so they might have to turn people away. Normally rationing of conference attendance is done by charging a fee for a limited number of slots. Maybe they wanted to base attendance on interest rather than willingness to spend.
But it would be nice to hear an official explanation.
XR: Extinction Rebellion, JSO: Just Stop Oil
(I wasn't familiar with these abbreviations and it took me a minute to figure them out.)