This naturally lends itself to the idea that there are two main ways of improving the future: increasing v̅ and increasing τ.
I think this is a useful two factor model, though I don’t quite think of avoiding existential risk just as increasing τ. I think of it more as increasing the probability that it doesn’t just end now, or at some other intermediate point. In my (unpublished) extensions of this model that I hint at in the chapter, I add a curve representing the probability of surviving to time t (or beyond), and then think of raising this curve as intervening on existential risk.
I think this is a useful two factor model, though I don’t quite think of avoiding existential risk just as increasing τ. I think of it more as increasing the probability that it doesn’t just end now, or at some other intermediate point. In my (unpublished) extensions of this model that I hint at in the chapter, I add a curve representing the probability of surviving to time t (or beyond), and then think of raising this curve as intervening on existential risk.