I feel like 5% of EA directed funding is a high bar to clear to agree with the statement ““AI welfare should be an EA priority”. I would have maybe pitched for maybe 1% 2% as the “priority” bar, which would still be 10 million dollars a year even under quite conservative assumptions as to what would be considered unrestricted EA funding.
This would mean that across all domains (X-risk, animal welfare, GHD) a theoretical maximum of 20 causes, more realistically maybe 5-15 causes (assuming some causes warrant 10-30% of funding) would be considered EA Priorities. 80,000 hours doesn’t have AI welfare in their top 8 causes but it is in their top 16, so I doubt it would clear the “5%” bar, even though they list it under their “Similarly pressing but less developed areas”, which feels priorityish to me (perhaos they could share their perspective?)
It could also depend how broadly we characterise causes. Is “Global Health and development” one cause, or are Mosquito nets, deworming and cash transfers all their own causes? I would suspect the latter.
Many people could therefore consider AI welfare an important cause area in their eyes but disagree with the debate statement because they don’t think it warrants a large 5%+ of EA funding despite its importance.
Or I could be wrong and many could consider 5% a reasonable or even low bar. Its clearly a subjective question and not the biggest deal but hey :D.
In ordinary language, I wouldn’t generally consider something that gets 1% of resources to be a “priority.” Applying your reasoning above, that would create a theoretical maximum of 100 “priorities” and a more realistic range of perhaps 10-40. As we move beyond the low teens, the idea of a “priority” gets pretty watered down in my book.
I feel like 5% of EA directed funding is a high bar to clear to agree with the statement ““AI welfare should be an EA priority”. I would have maybe pitched for maybe
1%2% as the “priority” bar, which would still be 10 million dollars a year even under quite conservative assumptions as to what would be considered unrestricted EA funding.This would mean that across all domains (X-risk, animal welfare, GHD) a theoretical maximum of 20 causes, more realistically maybe 5-15 causes (assuming some causes warrant 10-30% of funding) would be considered EA Priorities. 80,000 hours doesn’t have AI welfare in their top 8 causes but it is in their top 16, so I doubt it would clear the “5%” bar, even though they list it under their “Similarly pressing but less developed areas”, which feels priorityish to me (perhaos they could share their perspective?)
It could also depend how broadly we characterise causes. Is “Global Health and development” one cause, or are Mosquito nets, deworming and cash transfers all their own causes? I would suspect the latter.
Many people could therefore consider AI welfare an important cause area in their eyes but disagree with the debate statement because they don’t think it warrants a large 5%+ of EA funding despite its importance.
Or I could be wrong and many could consider 5% a reasonable or even low bar. Its clearly a subjective question and not the biggest deal but hey :D.
In ordinary language, I wouldn’t generally consider something that gets 1% of resources to be a “priority.” Applying your reasoning above, that would create a theoretical maximum of 100 “priorities” and a more realistic range of perhaps 10-40. As we move beyond the low teens, the idea of a “priority” gets pretty watered down in my book.
Thanks Jason, we clearly have different bars but you make a good point. I would consider 10-20 priorities fine. I will adjust up to 2% based on this.