Again, thanks both for this! Really appreciated you taking the time to collect these data and put your thoughts down in writing. Some more thoughts after coming back to this recently:
I liked the work dedicated to the Importance section as it’s helpful to put numbers on things to facilitate prioritization efforts. Focusing on economic damage and DALYs, though, probably doesn’t capture what I think are the biggest consequences: (1) the extent to which high tensions/fears of war increase the likelihood that military AI systems, dangerous bioweapons, or other future WMD tech is developed and deployed; (2) the effect a conflict would have on global cooperation and institutions that may shape future efforts to prevent pandemics, govern powerful technology, cooperate in space, etc. These are much more difficult to estimate and quantify, but seem worth mentioning to acknowledge the limits of INT analysis.
I was also left a bit unsure what to do with your DALY/economic cost estimates. Without estimates of tractability they can’t be plugged into a cost-effectiveness calculation. Again, appreciate the effort that went into laying out those scenarios, but I wasn’t quite sure what role they play in the post
Great to see the “Initial Grant Ideas”. In my experience, the difficulty of going from “this seems important” to “here are specific ideas of things to do that can be funded without a lot more work scoping a project, finding people to work on it, and finding an institutional home to support them” is underappreciated. There’s still a few steps left after this post, but writing down some specific ideas is really helpful.
If I put myself in the mindset of a philanthropist thinking “okay, great, what now?”, some missing pieces are: (1) where do I find early-career people with the interest and “intestinal fortitude” (your words!) to work on this problem, (2) how do I find an intellectual home for them that will provide strong supervision and policy connections, and (3) how do I prioritize among the problems within the China studies field to maximize effectiveness, given the limited number of people available to work in the space at the moment?
Tractability remains a huge uncertainty for me. It’s useful to have some case studies, but it’s hard to work out cost-effectiveness without a sense of how many rigorous research projects fail to have any impact for every one that does. It’s plausible to me that the median think tank piece has ~zero impact, and that even on average their impact on policy might be pretty negligible.
Again, thanks both for this! Really appreciated you taking the time to collect these data and put your thoughts down in writing. Some more thoughts after coming back to this recently:
I liked the work dedicated to the Importance section as it’s helpful to put numbers on things to facilitate prioritization efforts. Focusing on economic damage and DALYs, though, probably doesn’t capture what I think are the biggest consequences: (1) the extent to which high tensions/fears of war increase the likelihood that military AI systems, dangerous bioweapons, or other future WMD tech is developed and deployed; (2) the effect a conflict would have on global cooperation and institutions that may shape future efforts to prevent pandemics, govern powerful technology, cooperate in space, etc. These are much more difficult to estimate and quantify, but seem worth mentioning to acknowledge the limits of INT analysis.
I was also left a bit unsure what to do with your DALY/economic cost estimates. Without estimates of tractability they can’t be plugged into a cost-effectiveness calculation. Again, appreciate the effort that went into laying out those scenarios, but I wasn’t quite sure what role they play in the post
Great to see the “Initial Grant Ideas”. In my experience, the difficulty of going from “this seems important” to “here are specific ideas of things to do that can be funded without a lot more work scoping a project, finding people to work on it, and finding an institutional home to support them” is underappreciated. There’s still a few steps left after this post, but writing down some specific ideas is really helpful.
If I put myself in the mindset of a philanthropist thinking “okay, great, what now?”, some missing pieces are: (1) where do I find early-career people with the interest and “intestinal fortitude” (your words!) to work on this problem, (2) how do I find an intellectual home for them that will provide strong supervision and policy connections, and (3) how do I prioritize among the problems within the China studies field to maximize effectiveness, given the limited number of people available to work in the space at the moment?
Tractability remains a huge uncertainty for me. It’s useful to have some case studies, but it’s hard to work out cost-effectiveness without a sense of how many rigorous research projects fail to have any impact for every one that does. It’s plausible to me that the median think tank piece has ~zero impact, and that even on average their impact on policy might be pretty negligible.