I agree. Although I worry less about giving up (because that can lead to people working on more important causes) and more about working on the same cause with less passion on dedication, half-assing it. It reminds me of a LessWrong post The correct response to uncertainty is *not* half-speed. Ideally, under uncertainty about whether to continue working on something, you should decide what to do, and then do it with the same dedication you were working on it before. Maybe also put into your calendar a monthly reminder to consider if you should continue working on it and try not to think about it at other times.

Of course, we are human, and that can be difficult. If we think that what we are working on is less important, we might end up prioritizing other aspects of life at the expense of work more. But it’s important to remember that even if we are not working on the most important EA cause, it is still very important and can help many many people or animals. There’s no need to compare yourself to EAs that might be having even more impact most of the time, in the same way there is no need to keep comparing yourself with billionaires when trying to earn money. Let’s just all do what we can.

This is more adjacent than relevant, but the sentiment reminded me of this bit of wisdom…

Don’t scar on the first cut

from Rework by Jason Fried

The second something goes wrong, the natural tendency is to create a policy. “Someone’s wearing shorts!? We need a dress code!” No, you don’t. You just need to tell John not to wear shorts again.

Policies are organizational scar tissue. They are codified overreactions to situations that are unlikely to happen again. They are collective punishments for the misdeeds of an individual.

This is how bureaucracies are born. No one sets out to create a bureaucracy. They sneak up on companies slowly. They are created one policy—one scar—at a time.

So don’t scar on the first cut. Don’t create a policy because one person did something wrong once. Policies are only meant for situations that come up over and over again.

Really liked this one -brief and to the point! Here is my attempt to condense it further presuming I understood the author properly and also understood the ITN framework properly (correct me if I’m wrong about either!) :

Say I subscribed to the ITN (Importance, Tractability, Neglectedness) framework before I started my work on cause area X and wrote down my scores for I, T and N. When I look at an example of someone failing and giving up (like the one OP mentions in the post), my first instinct would be to do 2 things:

1. Increase the N score I had given earlier for X, since I now see one less person/​entity working on X.

2. Reduce the T score I had given earlier, since there is failure.

If I understood it correctly, this post argues that 2 should be modified: Modified 2. Maintain the T score I had given earlier, since the devil is in the details and the details of my solve are different from the failed solve I am looking at.

So, I still update my neglectedness (a small update) but maintain my tractability score (no update). Overall, not an “over-update”.