Disagree. Talent can be deployed in businesses, government, academia, and not-specifically-EA charities. You’d have to convince me that the work being done at the EA Hotel was better than top 1% of opportunities in those other areas before I thought, “Yes, it’s important for the community to find different ways to use all this excess talent.”
Edit: The EA Hotel could be worthwhile for other reasons; I just don’t think it should be used as a make-work program.
Perhaps that’s true, but I’m not sure if the EA Hotel residents are going to be in those top 1% opportunities otherwise. It’s not that they lack the talent, it’s just that it takes a certain kind of personality to be willing to do all the negative sum games* and goodharting and hoop-jumping to get those opportunities in the first place.
Taking myself as an example, I can’t stand subordinating myself to someone who seems to be unaligned or who seems to have bad judgment. I can’t stand competing. This means that my options are either to create my own work or to do something part-time minimum-effort and spend my life on something that isn’t my career.
Given the personal sacrifice of pursuing a career in EA, I wouldn’t be surprised if many EA’s are like that.
Disagree. Talent can be deployed in businesses, government, academia, and not-specifically-EA charities. You’d have to convince me that the work being done at the EA Hotel was better than top 1% of opportunities in those other areas before I thought, “Yes, it’s important for the community to find different ways to use all this excess talent.”
Edit: The EA Hotel could be worthwhile for other reasons; I just don’t think it should be used as a make-work program.
Perhaps that’s true, but I’m not sure if the EA Hotel residents are going to be in those top 1% opportunities otherwise. It’s not that they lack the talent, it’s just that it takes a certain kind of personality to be willing to do all the negative sum games* and goodharting and hoop-jumping to get those opportunities in the first place.
Taking myself as an example, I can’t stand subordinating myself to someone who seems to be unaligned or who seems to have bad judgment. I can’t stand competing. This means that my options are either to create my own work or to do something part-time minimum-effort and spend my life on something that isn’t my career.
Given the personal sacrifice of pursuing a career in EA, I wouldn’t be surprised if many EA’s are like that.
*like job applications
I’m not saying everyone should go into this, just that a portion should