The difference in cost-effectiveness estimates of animal welfare reforms versus alt protein is only a factor of three. Given the large uncertainties in these estimates, which can easily result in uncertainty ranges of a factor of 10 or more, my rule of thumb is that if the first best cost-effectiveness estimates do not show a difference larger than an order of 10, I assume the difference in cost-effectiveness is not (statistically) significant.
The probability that animal welfare reforms is more cost effective than alt protein may be higher than 50%, because you easily derived such a result with reasonable assumptions, but given these large uncertainties, I expect the probability is not much larger. Say 51% likelihood that animal welfare reforms are more effective than alt protein. If you keep the estimates to yourself (i.e. you don’t make recommendations to others based on your estimates), and if you are a small donor, there are no decreasing marginal returns and no coordination issues, and hence it is rational to donate 100% of your own donations to the most effective charity according to your first best estimates, which has a 51% probability of being the best charity. However, for large donations, or for the total donations of the EA community as a whole, there may be decreasing marginal returns, and I think in that case diversifying is more important than putting all eggs in one basket (pun intended) with a 51% probability of being the best basket. I believe as a rule of thumb, if you communicate your results to other EA people and give recommendations, you have to consider the total donations of the EA community instead of the donations of an individual, small EA donor. Otherwise your recommendations should mention the need for coordination with other donors, but that message is more complex. So you can recommend: “Donate everything to this charity that has a 51% probability of being the most cost-effective, but keep an eye on what other effective altruists are doing, how much they are donating to the different charities.”, or you can recommend “Diversify: donate something to animal welfare reforms and the rest to alt protein.”
Hence, given you published the above post and made it public to the community, I suggest you recommend diversifying donations to both animal welfare reforms and alt protein. And privately you can donate 100% of your donations to what you believe is the most effective charity, as long as you do not recommend others to do the same.
The difference in cost-effectiveness estimates of animal welfare reforms versus alt protein is only a factor of three. Given the large uncertainties in these estimates, which can easily result in uncertainty ranges of a factor of 10 or more, my rule of thumb is that if the first best cost-effectiveness estimates do not show a difference larger than an order of 10, I assume the difference in cost-effectiveness is not (statistically) significant.
The probability that animal welfare reforms is more cost effective than alt protein may be higher than 50%, because you easily derived such a result with reasonable assumptions, but given these large uncertainties, I expect the probability is not much larger. Say 51% likelihood that animal welfare reforms are more effective than alt protein. If you keep the estimates to yourself (i.e. you don’t make recommendations to others based on your estimates), and if you are a small donor, there are no decreasing marginal returns and no coordination issues, and hence it is rational to donate 100% of your own donations to the most effective charity according to your first best estimates, which has a 51% probability of being the best charity. However, for large donations, or for the total donations of the EA community as a whole, there may be decreasing marginal returns, and I think in that case diversifying is more important than putting all eggs in one basket (pun intended) with a 51% probability of being the best basket. I believe as a rule of thumb, if you communicate your results to other EA people and give recommendations, you have to consider the total donations of the EA community instead of the donations of an individual, small EA donor. Otherwise your recommendations should mention the need for coordination with other donors, but that message is more complex. So you can recommend: “Donate everything to this charity that has a 51% probability of being the most cost-effective, but keep an eye on what other effective altruists are doing, how much they are donating to the different charities.”, or you can recommend “Diversify: donate something to animal welfare reforms and the rest to alt protein.”
Hence, given you published the above post and made it public to the community, I suggest you recommend diversifying donations to both animal welfare reforms and alt protein. And privately you can donate 100% of your donations to what you believe is the most effective charity, as long as you do not recommend others to do the same.