I realise I didn’t make this distinction, so I’m shifting the goalposts slightly, but I think it’s worth distinguishing between ‘direct work’ organisations and EA infrastructure. It seems pretty clear from the OP that the latter is being strongly encouraged to primarily support EA/longtermist work.
Im a bit confused about the grammar of the last sentence—are you saying that EA infrastructure is getting more emphasis than direct work, or that people interested in infrastructural work are being encouraged to primarily support longtermism?
I’d imagine it’s much harder to argue that something like community building is cost-effective within something like global health, than within longtermist focused areas? There’s much more capacity to turn money into direct work/bednets, and those direct options seem pretty hard to beat in terms of cost effectiveness.
Community building can be nonspecific, where you try to get a build a group of people who have some common interest (such as something under big tent EA), or specific, where you try to get people who are working on some specific thing (such as working on AI/longtermist projects, or moving in that direction). My sense is that (per the OP), community builders are being pressured to do the latter.
I realise I didn’t make this distinction, so I’m shifting the goalposts slightly, but I think it’s worth distinguishing between ‘direct work’ organisations and EA infrastructure. It seems pretty clear from the OP that the latter is being strongly encouraged to primarily support EA/longtermist work.
Im a bit confused about the grammar of the last sentence—are you saying that EA infrastructure is getting more emphasis than direct work, or that people interested in infrastructural work are being encouraged to primarily support longtermism?
Sorry—the latter.
I’d imagine it’s much harder to argue that something like community building is cost-effective within something like global health, than within longtermist focused areas? There’s much more capacity to turn money into direct work/bednets, and those direct options seem pretty hard to beat in terms of cost effectiveness.
Community building can be nonspecific, where you try to get a build a group of people who have some common interest (such as something under big tent EA), or specific, where you try to get people who are working on some specific thing (such as working on AI/longtermist projects, or moving in that direction). My sense is that (per the OP), community builders are being pressured to do the latter.