There seems to be a “intentions don’t matter, results do” lesson that’s relevant here. Intending to solve AI alignment is secondary, and doesn’t mean that you’re making progress on the problem.
And we don’t want people saying “I’m working on AI” just for the social status, if that’s not their comparative advantage and they’re not actually being productive.
Yes that’s exactly it! Even if a lot of people think that AI is the most important problem to work on, I would expect only a small minority to have a comparative advantage. I worry that students are setting themselves up for burnout and failure by feeling obligated to work on what’s been billed as some as the most pressing/impactful cause area, and I worry that it’s getting in the way of people exploring with different roles and figuring out and building out their actual comparative advantage
There seems to be a “intentions don’t matter, results do” lesson that’s relevant here. Intending to solve AI alignment is secondary, and doesn’t mean that you’re making progress on the problem.
And we don’t want people saying “I’m working on AI” just for the social status, if that’s not their comparative advantage and they’re not actually being productive.
Yes that’s exactly it! Even if a lot of people think that AI is the most important problem to work on, I would expect only a small minority to have a comparative advantage. I worry that students are setting themselves up for burnout and failure by feeling obligated to work on what’s been billed as some as the most pressing/impactful cause area, and I worry that it’s getting in the way of people exploring with different roles and figuring out and building out their actual comparative advantage