I did internal modeling/forecasting for our fundraising figures, and at least on the first pass it looked like our longtermist work was more likely to be funding constrained than our other priority cause areas, at least if “funding constrained” is narrowly defined as “what’s the probability that we do not raise all the money that we’d like for all planned operations to run smoothly.”
My main reasoning was somewhat outside-viewy and focused on general uncertainty: our longtermist team is new, and relative to other of Rethink’s cause areas, less well-established with less of a track record of either a) prior funding, b) public work other than Luisa’s nuclear risk work, or c) a well-vetted research plan. So I’m just generally unsure of these things.
Three major caveats:
1. I did those forecasts in late October and now I think my original figures were too pessimistic.
2. Another caveat is that my predictions were more a reflection of my own uncertainty than a lack of inside view confidence in the team. For context, my 5th-95th percentile credible interval spanned ~an order of magnitude across all cause areas.
3. When making the original numbers, I incorporated but plausibly substantially underrated the degree that the forecasts will change and not just reflect reality. For example, Peter and Marcus may have prioritized different decisions accordingly due to my numbers, or this comment may affect other people’s decisions.
I did internal modeling/forecasting for our fundraising figures, and at least on the first pass it looked like our longtermist work was more likely to be funding constrained than our other priority cause areas, at least if “funding constrained” is narrowly defined as “what’s the probability that we do not raise all the money that we’d like for all planned operations to run smoothly.”
My main reasoning was somewhat outside-viewy and focused on general uncertainty: our longtermist team is new, and relative to other of Rethink’s cause areas, less well-established with less of a track record of either a) prior funding, b) public work other than Luisa’s nuclear risk work, or c) a well-vetted research plan. So I’m just generally unsure of these things.
Three major caveats:
1. I did those forecasts in late October and now I think my original figures were too pessimistic.
2. Another caveat is that my predictions were more a reflection of my own uncertainty than a lack of inside view confidence in the team. For context, my 5th-95th percentile credible interval spanned ~an order of magnitude across all cause areas.
3. When making the original numbers, I incorporated but plausibly substantially underrated the degree that the forecasts will change and not just reflect reality. For example, Peter and Marcus may have prioritized different decisions accordingly due to my numbers, or this comment may affect other people’s decisions.