I think I agree that the cutoff is if anything higher than top 3% which is why I said originally ‘at best’. The smaller that top number is the more glaring is the oversight not to mention this explicitly everytime we have conversations on this topic.
I have been thinking about the initiative bit, thank you for bringing it up. It seems to me that ability and initiative/independentmindedness somewhat tradeoff against each other, so if you are not on the top 3% (or whatever) for ability, you might be able to still have more impact through direct work than donations with a lot of initiative. Buck argues along these lines in his post on doing good through non-standard EA career paths.
That would also be my response to ‘but you can work in government or academia’. As soon as “impact” is not strictly speaking in your job description and therefore your impact won’t just come from having higher aptitude than the second best candidate, you can possibly do a lot of good by showing a lot of initiative.
The same can be said re. what Jonas said below:
I’m also thinking that there seem to be quite a few exceptions. E.g., the Zurich ballot initiative I was involved in had contributors from a very broad range of backgrounds. I’ve also seen people from less privileged backgrounds make excellent contributions in operations-related roles, in fundraising, or by welcoming newcomers to the community. I’m sure I’m missing many further examples. I think these paths are harder to find than priority paths, but they exist, and often seem pretty impactful to me.
If you are good at initiative you are maybe able to find the high impact paths which are harder to find than the priority paths and “make up” for lower ability this way.
I think I agree that the cutoff is if anything higher than top 3% which is why I said originally ‘at best’. The smaller that top number is the more glaring is the oversight not to mention this explicitly everytime we have conversations on this topic.
I have been thinking about the initiative bit, thank you for bringing it up. It seems to me that ability and initiative/independentmindedness somewhat tradeoff against each other, so if you are not on the top 3% (or whatever) for ability, you might be able to still have more impact through direct work than donations with a lot of initiative. Buck argues along these lines in his post on doing good through non-standard EA career paths.
That would also be my response to ‘but you can work in government or academia’. As soon as “impact” is not strictly speaking in your job description and therefore your impact won’t just come from having higher aptitude than the second best candidate, you can possibly do a lot of good by showing a lot of initiative.
The same can be said re. what Jonas said below:
If you are good at initiative you are maybe able to find the high impact paths which are harder to find than the priority paths and “make up” for lower ability this way.