We don’t always try to convert the answers to these questions to the same “currency” as our cost-effectiveness estimates, because we think entertaining multiple perspectives ultimately makes our decision-making more robust. We’ve previously written about this here, and we think these arguments still ring true. In particular, we think cluster-style thinking (Figure 6) handles unknown-unknowns in a more robust way, as we find that expert opinion is often a good predictor of “which way the arguments I haven’t thought of yet will point.”
This is the blog post being referenced. Its about exactly the problem you describe.
Hmm it’s not very clear to me that it would be effective at addressing the problem—it seems a bit abstract as described. And addressing Pascal’s mugging issues seems like it potentially requires modifying how cost effectiveness estimates are done ie modifying one component of the “cluster” rather than it just being a cluster vs sequence thinking matter. It would be good to hear more about how this kind of thinking is influencing decisions about giving grants in actual cases like deworming if it is being used.
From the post:
This is the blog post being referenced. Its about exactly the problem you describe.
Hmm it’s not very clear to me that it would be effective at addressing the problem—it seems a bit abstract as described. And addressing Pascal’s mugging issues seems like it potentially requires modifying how cost effectiveness estimates are done ie modifying one component of the “cluster” rather than it just being a cluster vs sequence thinking matter. It would be good to hear more about how this kind of thinking is influencing decisions about giving grants in actual cases like deworming if it is being used.