Longtermism in its nascent form relies on a lot guesstimates and abstractions that I think could be made more empirical and solid. Personally, I am very interested in asking whether people at x time in the past had the information they needed to avoid later disasters that occurred. What kinds of catastrophes have humans been able to foresee, and when we were able to but didn’t, what obstacles were in the way? History is the only evidence available in a lot of longtermist domains and I don’t see EA exploiting it enough.
Longtermism in its nascent form relies on a lot guesstimates and abstractions that I think could be made more empirical and solid. Personally, I am very interested in asking whether people at x time in the past had the information they needed to avoid later disasters that occurred. What kinds of catastrophes have humans been able to foresee, and when we were able to but didn’t, what obstacles were in the way? History is the only evidence available in a lot of longtermist domains and I don’t see EA exploiting it enough.