*How* are you getting these numbers? At this point, I think I’m more interested in the methodologies of how to arrive at an estimate than about the estimates themselves
For the top number, I’m aware of at least one intervention* where people’s ideas of whether it’s a good idea to fund moved from “no” to “yes” in the last few years, without (AFAIK) particularly important new empirical or conceptual information. So I did a backwards extrapolation from that. For the next numbers, I a) considered that maybe I’m biased in favor of this intervention, so I’m rosier on the xrisk reduced here than others (cf optimizer’s curse), and grantmakers probably have lower numbers on xrisks reduced and b) considered my own conception of how much capital may come to longtermist EA in the future, and decided that I’m probably rosier on our capital than these implied numbers will entail. Put another way, I started with a conservative-ish estimate, then updated down on how much xrisk we can realistically buy off for $X at current margins (which increases $/xrisk), then updated upwards on how much $s we can have access to (which also increases $/xrisk).
My friend started with all the funds available in EA, divided by the estimated remaining xrisk, and then applied some discount factor for marginal vs average interventions, and got some similar if slightly smaller numbers.
You said ‘I’m aware of at least one intervention* where people’s ideas of whether it’s a good idea to fund moved from “no” to “yes” in the last few years’. Would you be able to provide the source of this please?
*How* are you getting these numbers? At this point, I think I’m more interested in the methodologies of how to arrive at an estimate than about the estimates themselves
For the top number, I’m aware of at least one intervention* where people’s ideas of whether it’s a good idea to fund moved from “no” to “yes” in the last few years, without (AFAIK) particularly important new empirical or conceptual information. So I did a backwards extrapolation from that. For the next numbers, I a) considered that maybe I’m biased in favor of this intervention, so I’m rosier on the xrisk reduced here than others (cf optimizer’s curse), and grantmakers probably have lower numbers on xrisks reduced and b) considered my own conception of how much capital may come to longtermist EA in the future, and decided that I’m probably rosier on our capital than these implied numbers will entail. Put another way, I started with a conservative-ish estimate, then updated down on how much xrisk we can realistically buy off for $X at current margins (which increases $/xrisk), then updated upwards on how much $s we can have access to (which also increases $/xrisk).
My friend started with all the funds available in EA, divided by the estimated remaining xrisk, and then applied some discount factor for marginal vs average interventions, and got some similar if slightly smaller numbers.
*apologies for the vagueness
You said ‘I’m aware of at least one intervention* where people’s ideas of whether it’s a good idea to fund moved from “no” to “yes” in the last few years’. Would you be able to provide the source of this please?
No, sorry!