I’m really glad the Global Priorities Project exists and I look forward to seeing more research. I think this piece was also particularly well-written in a very accessible yet academic voice.
That being said, I’m not sure the intention of this piece, but it feels neither novel nor thorough. I’m excited that my calculator is linked in this piece, but to clarify I no longer hold the view that those cost-effectiveness estimates are to be taken as the end-all of the impact, and I don’t think any EAs still do.
Furthermore, many people now argue that the impact of working on animals is to have a long-term gestalt shift in the view to help not humans, but rather future animals. Ending factory farming, for example, would have a large compounding effect on all future animals that are no longer factory farmed, toward the future, and attitude change is the only way to make that happen.
Likewise, some people (though I’m unsure) think that spreading anti-speciesism might be a critical gateway toward helping people expand their moral concern to wild animals or computer programs (e.g., suffering subroutines) in the far future too.
It’s not just that this piece doesn’t address this fact, but it seems to ignore the possibility entirely by focusing (somewhat dogmatically) on humans.
Thanks for the comments. I actually agree that it’s neither novel nor thorough. It was written not as a research piece but to fill a (perceived) gap in the recorded EA conversation on this. I think we have cases where thinking outstrips accessible accounts of the output, and we need to make sure that there’s a good route into these things for people coming at it anew.
I didn’t want to spend too long looking at the ways that animal interventions today could help future animals, although I agree that this is an important route to impact (which I did flag: “Moreover, if it could achieve a lasting improvement in societal values, it might have a large benefit in improved animal welfare over the long-term.”)
I guess overall the tone of the piece is not quite right for you—which makes sense as you’re a little too informed to be the target audience. The takeaway is supposed to be that the routes to impacting the far future are by impacting humans today. I’m not trying to draw any conclusions about the nature of those interventions (although I use human welfare interventions as an easy-to-grok example and because their long-term effects have been discussed elsewhere).
I’m really glad the Global Priorities Project exists and I look forward to seeing more research. I think this piece was also particularly well-written in a very accessible yet academic voice.
That being said, I’m not sure the intention of this piece, but it feels neither novel nor thorough. I’m excited that my calculator is linked in this piece, but to clarify I no longer hold the view that those cost-effectiveness estimates are to be taken as the end-all of the impact, and I don’t think any EAs still do.
Furthermore, many people now argue that the impact of working on animals is to have a long-term gestalt shift in the view to help not humans, but rather future animals. Ending factory farming, for example, would have a large compounding effect on all future animals that are no longer factory farmed, toward the future, and attitude change is the only way to make that happen.
Likewise, some people (though I’m unsure) think that spreading anti-speciesism might be a critical gateway toward helping people expand their moral concern to wild animals or computer programs (e.g., suffering subroutines) in the far future too.
It’s not just that this piece doesn’t address this fact, but it seems to ignore the possibility entirely by focusing (somewhat dogmatically) on humans.
Thanks for the comments. I actually agree that it’s neither novel nor thorough. It was written not as a research piece but to fill a (perceived) gap in the recorded EA conversation on this. I think we have cases where thinking outstrips accessible accounts of the output, and we need to make sure that there’s a good route into these things for people coming at it anew.
I didn’t want to spend too long looking at the ways that animal interventions today could help future animals, although I agree that this is an important route to impact (which I did flag: “Moreover, if it could achieve a lasting improvement in societal values, it might have a large benefit in improved animal welfare over the long-term.”)
I guess overall the tone of the piece is not quite right for you—which makes sense as you’re a little too informed to be the target audience. The takeaway is supposed to be that the routes to impacting the far future are by impacting humans today. I’m not trying to draw any conclusions about the nature of those interventions (although I use human welfare interventions as an easy-to-grok example and because their long-term effects have been discussed elsewhere).