Kat Woods 🔶 ⏸️ comments on Invisible impact loss (and why we can be too error-averse)

[Kat Woods 🔶 ⏸️]

I couldn’t agree more with this post. I’ve been referring to it in my circles as the “risks of inaction” and “leaving impact on the table”, if any of those terms resonate more with people.

Will MacAskill also mentioned in a post once the “bureaucrat’s curse”, which I love. It’s the inverse of the unilateralist’s curse, where if just one person doesn’t like the idea, it gets killed.

I see this everywhere, especially in longtermism. The fear of accidentally making things worse (which is a warranted fear!), overshadows the fear of accidentally moving too slowly.

If you’re on a bus hurtling towards a cliff, instinctively acting in a panic can make things worse, but also moving too slowly or not at all also leads to high downsides

[Lizka]

Thank you!

I also really like the phrase bureaucrat’s curse. Here’s the relevant passage (in this post):

As well as the unilateralist’s curse (where the most optimistic decision-maker determines what happens), there’s a risk of falling into what we could call the bureaucrat’s curse,^[10] where everyone has a veto over the actions of others; in such a situation, if everyone follows their own best-guesses, then the most pessimistic decision-maker determines what happens. I’ve certainly seen something closer to the bureaucrat’s curse in play: if you’re getting feedback and your plans, and one person voices strong objections, it feels irresponsible to go ahead anyway, even in cases where you should. At its worst, I’ve seen the idea of unilateralism taken as a reason against competition within the EA ecosystem, as if all EA organisations should be monopolies.

(In a comment, Linch points out that this is a special case of the unilateralist’s curse.) I also really like the suggestions below the cited passage — on what we need to do or keep doing to manage risks properly:

• Stay in constant communication about our plans with others, inside and outside of the EA community, who have similar aims to do the most good they can

• Remember that, in the standard solution to the unilateralist’s dilemma, it’s the median view that’s the right (rather than the most optimistic or most pessimistic view)

• Are highly willing to course-correct in response to feedback

(In writing, I think there’s something somewhat related to the bureaucrat’s curse, which is writing-by-committee, or what Stephen Clare called “death by feedback”.)