I think the opposite might be true: when you apply it to broad areas, you’re likely to mistake low neglectedness for a signal of low tractability, and you should just look at “are there good opportunities at current margins.” When you start looking at individual solutions, it starts being quite relevant whether they have already been tried. (This point already made here.)
That’s interesting, but seems to be addressing a somewhat separate claim to mine.
My claim was that that broad heuristics are more often necessary and appropriate when engaged in abstract evaluation of broad cause areas, where you can’t directly assess how promising concrete opportunities/interventions are, and less so when you can directly assess concrete interventions.
If I understand your claims correctly they are that:
Neglectedness is more likely to be misleading when applied to broad cause areas
When considering individual solutions, it’s useful to consider whether the intervention has already been tried.
I generally agree that applying broad heuristics to broad cause areas is more likely to be misleading than when you can assess specific opportunities directly. Implicit in my claim is that where you don’t have to rely on broad heuristics, but can assess specific opportunities directly, then this is preferable. I agree that considering whether a specific intervention has been tried before is useful and relevant information, but don’t consider that an application of the Neglectedness/Crowdedness heuristic.
I think the opposite might be true: when you apply it to broad areas, you’re likely to mistake low neglectedness for a signal of low tractability, and you should just look at “are there good opportunities at current margins.” When you start looking at individual solutions, it starts being quite relevant whether they have already been tried. (This point already made here.)
That’s interesting, but seems to be addressing a somewhat separate claim to mine.
My claim was that that broad heuristics are more often necessary and appropriate when engaged in abstract evaluation of broad cause areas, where you can’t directly assess how promising concrete opportunities/interventions are, and less so when you can directly assess concrete interventions.
If I understand your claims correctly they are that:
Neglectedness is more likely to be misleading when applied to broad cause areas
When considering individual solutions, it’s useful to consider whether the intervention has already been tried.
I generally agree that applying broad heuristics to broad cause areas is more likely to be misleading than when you can assess specific opportunities directly. Implicit in my claim is that where you don’t have to rely on broad heuristics, but can assess specific opportunities directly, then this is preferable. I agree that considering whether a specific intervention has been tried before is useful and relevant information, but don’t consider that an application of the Neglectedness/Crowdedness heuristic.