In this report on bottlenecks in the X-risk research community, the main suggestion was to improve the senior researcher pipeline. What do you think about the senior researcher pipeline in prioritization research?
I think it would always be good to have more senior researchers, but they seem rather hard to find. Right now, my personal view is that the best way to build senior researchers is to hire and train mid-level or junior-level researchers. We hope to keep doing this with our past hires, existing hires, and our upcoming intern program.
If you’re interested in funding researcher talent development, I think funding our intern program is a very competitive opportunity.
I haven’t read that report in full, but I imagine that it’s such a big issue in the X-risk research because it grew very quickly from an obscure field, to a field with a lot of funding available and a lot of people wanting to work in it. I think it’s a rare situation, and I don’t feel that it’s a significant problem in the kind of research that I do (farmed animal welfare). I remember hearing that it is a problem in cultured meat R&D though, and it makes sense, the situation is similar.
That makes sense, thanks. I’ve checked with people in cultured meat, and they seem to agree with you—e.g. startup companies are looking for hires that have broadly relevant PhD experience (less than what I’d count senior) and some major companies have a single scientific advisor who, while being accomplished academics, are not very familiar with the field.
In this report on bottlenecks in the X-risk research community, the main suggestion was to improve the senior researcher pipeline. What do you think about the senior researcher pipeline in prioritization research?
I think it would always be good to have more senior researchers, but they seem rather hard to find. Right now, my personal view is that the best way to build senior researchers is to hire and train mid-level or junior-level researchers. We hope to keep doing this with our past hires, existing hires, and our upcoming intern program.
If you’re interested in funding researcher talent development, I think funding our intern program is a very competitive opportunity.
I haven’t read that report in full, but I imagine that it’s such a big issue in the X-risk research because it grew very quickly from an obscure field, to a field with a lot of funding available and a lot of people wanting to work in it. I think it’s a rare situation, and I don’t feel that it’s a significant problem in the kind of research that I do (farmed animal welfare). I remember hearing that it is a problem in cultured meat R&D though, and it makes sense, the situation is similar.
That makes sense, thanks. I’ve checked with people in cultured meat, and they seem to agree with you—e.g. startup companies are looking for hires that have broadly relevant PhD experience (less than what I’d count senior) and some major companies have a single scientific advisor who, while being accomplished academics, are not very familiar with the field.