I agree with you that the positions are not actually symmetric, and I think your second paragraph is close to word-for-word what I said in my penultimate paragraph. However, if you phrase it as you did in the OP (and this isn’t just you by any means), then your arguments are symmetric and so you’ve proved nothing. I think it’s worth explaining what makes actually these two cases different.
The reason I think it’s worth explaining is highlighted in my last paragraph; what might seem like me being pedantic actually has very significant implications for how you evaluate meta-activities, and indeed I’ve clashed with Robin Hanson on that exact issue.
I was only targetting this for donors focussed on global poverty—if you’re thinking about x-risk or movement building, I think other considerations dominate entirely.
I agree with you that the positions are not actually symmetric, and I think your second paragraph is close to word-for-word what I said in my penultimate paragraph. However, if you phrase it as you did in the OP (and this isn’t just you by any means), then your arguments are symmetric and so you’ve proved nothing. I think it’s worth explaining what makes actually these two cases different.
The reason I think it’s worth explaining is highlighted in my last paragraph; what might seem like me being pedantic actually has very significant implications for how you evaluate meta-activities, and indeed I’ve clashed with Robin Hanson on that exact issue.
I was only targetting this for donors focussed on global poverty—if you’re thinking about x-risk or movement building, I think other considerations dominate entirely.