I really wish you can put more of your evidence out there instead of
sentences that are a summary of the evidence you have. “Another
bottleneck to progress on GPR might be operations staff” (GPR
Key-ideas). Is it a bottleneck or is it not? I don’t know what to
make of “might be”. In this case if you presented your evidence that
helps conclude this, say in a footnote, I think it will be more
useful. People can then draw the conclusion for themselves.
To be specific, I think it’s longtermist organisations that are
most talent constrained. Global health and factory farming
organisations are much more constrained by funding relatively
speaking (e.g. GiveWell top recommended charities could absorb
~$100m). I think this explains why organisations like TLYCS,
Charity Science and Charity Entrepreneurship say they’re more
funding constrained (and also to some extent Rethink priorities,
which does a significant fraction of its work in this area).
I am glad you clarify about your position that you are focused on
longtermism TC. I only know of two cases where longtermism positions
are TC. Disentanglement research as informed by Carrick Flynn in Sep
2017 and AI Policy in US in Jan 2019 article). It still stands
that Open Phil in GR seems to be not TC. (“The pool of available
talent is strong, … more than a hundred applicants had very strong
resumes… but … (to) deploy this base of available talent is weak”)
I think what helps is to keep the TC debate focused on to specific
cases. And this can be done with providing evidence as done in AI
Policy in US.
Even within longtermist and meta organisations, not every
organisation is mainly skill-constrained, so you can find
counterexamples, such as new organisations without much
funding. This may also explain the difference between the average
survey respondents and Rethink Priorities’ view.
Claims: Average Survey respondents feel they are TC more than RP
because they have less funding needs than RP (and is “new”).
Example: Open Phil is an average survey respondent (I
presume). Open Phil has funding. Open Phil does not seem to feel TC in
GR though.
It looks like the example does not satisfy the claim. So now I don’t
really know what you are talking about. I don’t have one example of an
org and a position that is skill-constrained in research in GPR. I
keep hearing you saying that “research is the biggest need right
now” (key-ideas post) but when I look in Open Phil it doesn’t
seem to be so. They are unable to absorb more researchers. So what
exactly are you talking about?
You might wonder why I am quoting the same Open Phil example like a
parrot. That is because that is one of the few hiring rounds
available. And trying to ask companies like FHI or Open Phil etc., for
more info on this or dollars moved by researcher or about
replaceability does not seem to produce results unfortunately.
It doesn’t seem to me that looking at whether lots of people
applied to a job tells us much about how talent constrained an
organization is.
The definition for TC is that an org is unable to find “skilled
people” despite hiring actively. I agree that number of people applied
is not a measure for TC. But the number of people in the last round
(after 4 other rounds) seems to suggest something regarding if orgs
are able to find skilled people or not. Even if that is not the case
--> When you look at what Open Phil says, I can’t imagine that they
are TC in GR based on the numbers of people who they thought had good
resumes. In fact it seems like a bad idea to push for research at Open
Phil (GPR) in GR considering replaceability atleast. And the more I
talk to people like Peter Hurford (about replaceability) the more I
feel like there is less point in being a GR.
About “successful applicants might have been still much better” (due
to the potential log-normal distribution of candidates ability), I
would also like one example for a case where this is true. I don’t
think that is the case with Open Phil in GR based on their hiring
round.
Aaron also raised this point as well. Yes that is definitely a
possibility that people would still be hired but the organization
would continue to be TC. Seems like a reasonable hypothesis but still
needs evidence (one example at least) to support it I think.
Nevertheless, I don’t think that is the case with Open Phil in GR
based on their hiring round.
Something else I think is relevant to the question of whether our
top problem areas are talent constrained is that I think many
community members should seek positions in government, academia
and other existing institutions. These roles are all ‘talent
constrained’, in the sense that hundreds of people could take
these positions without the community needing to gain any
additional funding. In particular, we think there is room for a
significant number of people to take AI policy careers, as
argued here.
AI policy careers in the US seems to match the definition of
TC. “80,000 Hours has attended, speakers have lamented the
government’s lack of expertise on AI, and noted the substantial demand
for such expertise within government. For example, DoD’s new Joint AI
Center alone is apparently looking to hire up to 200 people.”. I
didn’t know this before. This is so clear for me now, that I have an
example for what you mean with “significant number of people”. I wish
the same was available for other top problem areas.
Thanks for this.
Thank you very much for taking the time to respond. I very much
appreciate it. I would really appreciate more evidence displayed for
claims and less generalization with 80khours blogs.
P.S
If you already know many opportunities are high-impact, I expect that
you have looked at the value contributed by several people, and
factored things like replaceability etc., before you came to a
decision. Why not just publish it? Asking companies doesn’t seem
practical and no one seems to be giving out such information. One
author even suggested that only if I am writing an academic paper he
would be able to help otherwise he didn’t find time for it.
Thank You for acknowledging this post. I very much appreciate your reply.
I really wish you can put more of your evidence out there instead of sentences that are a summary of the evidence you have. “Another bottleneck to progress on GPR might be operations staff” (GPR Key-ideas). Is it a bottleneck or is it not? I don’t know what to make of “might be”. In this case if you presented your evidence that helps conclude this, say in a footnote, I think it will be more useful. People can then draw the conclusion for themselves.
I am glad you clarify about your position that you are focused on longtermism TC. I only know of two cases where longtermism positions are TC. Disentanglement research as informed by Carrick Flynn in Sep 2017 and AI Policy in US in Jan 2019 article). It still stands that Open Phil in GR seems to be not TC. (“The pool of available talent is strong, … more than a hundred applicants had very strong resumes… but … (to) deploy this base of available talent is weak”)
I think what helps is to keep the TC debate focused on to specific cases. And this can be done with providing evidence as done in AI Policy in US.
Claims: Average Survey respondents feel they are TC more than RP because they have less funding needs than RP (and is “new”).
Example: Open Phil is an average survey respondent (I presume). Open Phil has funding. Open Phil does not seem to feel TC in GR though.
It looks like the example does not satisfy the claim. So now I don’t really know what you are talking about. I don’t have one example of an org and a position that is skill-constrained in research in GPR. I keep hearing you saying that “research is the biggest need right now” (key-ideas post) but when I look in Open Phil it doesn’t seem to be so. They are unable to absorb more researchers. So what exactly are you talking about?
You might wonder why I am quoting the same Open Phil example like a parrot. That is because that is one of the few hiring rounds available. And trying to ask companies like FHI or Open Phil etc., for more info on this or dollars moved by researcher or about replaceability does not seem to produce results unfortunately.
The definition for TC is that an org is unable to find “skilled people” despite hiring actively. I agree that number of people applied is not a measure for TC. But the number of people in the last round (after 4 other rounds) seems to suggest something regarding if orgs are able to find skilled people or not. Even if that is not the case --> When you look at what Open Phil says, I can’t imagine that they are TC in GR based on the numbers of people who they thought had good resumes. In fact it seems like a bad idea to push for research at Open Phil (GPR) in GR considering replaceability atleast. And the more I talk to people like Peter Hurford (about replaceability) the more I feel like there is less point in being a GR.
About “successful applicants might have been still much better” (due to the potential log-normal distribution of candidates ability), I would also like one example for a case where this is true. I don’t think that is the case with Open Phil in GR based on their hiring round.
Aaron also raised this point as well. Yes that is definitely a possibility that people would still be hired but the organization would continue to be TC. Seems like a reasonable hypothesis but still needs evidence (one example at least) to support it I think. Nevertheless, I don’t think that is the case with Open Phil in GR based on their hiring round.
AI policy careers in the US seems to match the definition of TC. “80,000 Hours has attended, speakers have lamented the government’s lack of expertise on AI, and noted the substantial demand for such expertise within government. For example, DoD’s new Joint AI Center alone is apparently looking to hire up to 200 people.”. I didn’t know this before. This is so clear for me now, that I have an example for what you mean with “significant number of people”. I wish the same was available for other top problem areas.
Thanks for this.
Thank you very much for taking the time to respond. I very much appreciate it. I would really appreciate more evidence displayed for claims and less generalization with 80khours blogs.
P.S
If you already know many opportunities are high-impact, I expect that you have looked at the value contributed by several people, and factored things like replaceability etc., before you came to a decision. Why not just publish it? Asking companies doesn’t seem practical and no one seems to be giving out such information. One author even suggested that only if I am writing an academic paper he would be able to help otherwise he didn’t find time for it.