For example, a single percentage point of reduction of existential risks would be worth (from a utilitarian expected utility point-of-view) a delay of over 10 million years.
I’m curious how many EAs believe this claim literally, and think a 10 million year pause (assuming it’s feasible in the first place) would be justified if it reduced existential risk by a single percentage point. Given the disagree votes to my other comments, it seems a fair number might in fact agree to the literal claim here.
Given my disagreement that we should take these numbers literally, I think it might be worth writing a post about why we should have a pragmatic non-zero discount rate, even from a purely longtermist perspective.
I’m curious how many EAs believe this claim literally, and think a 10 million year pause (assuming it’s feasible in the first place) would be justified if it reduced existential risk by a single percentage point. Given the disagree votes to my other comments, it seems a fair number might in fact agree to the literal claim here.
Given my disagreement that we should take these numbers literally, I think it might be worth writing a post about why we should have a pragmatic non-zero discount rate, even from a purely longtermist perspective.