Will MacAskill mentioned in this comment that he’d ‘expect that, say, a panel of superforecasters, after being exposed to all the arguments, would be closer to my view than to the median FHI view.’
You’re a good forecaster right? Does it seem right to you that a panel of good forecasters would come to something like Will’s view, rather than the median FHI view?
I’ll speak for the consensus when I say I think there’s not a clear way to decide if this is correct without actually doing it—and the outcome would depend a lot on what level of engagement the superforecasters had with these ideas already. (If I got to pick the 5 superforecasters, even excluding myself, I could guarantee it was either closer to FHI’s viewpoints, or to Will’s.) Even if we picked from a “fair” reference class, if I could have them spend 2 weeks at FHI talking to people there, I think a reasonable proportion would be convinced—though perhaps this is less a function of updating neutrally towards correct ideas as it is the emergence of consensus in groups.
Lastly, I have tremendous respect for Will, but I don’t know that he’s calibrated particularly well to make a prediction like this. (Not that I know he isn’t—I just don’t have any reason to think he’s spent much time working on this skillset.)
Thanks for the answer.
Will MacAskill mentioned in this comment that he’d ‘expect that, say, a panel of superforecasters, after being exposed to all the arguments, would be closer to my view than to the median FHI view.’
You’re a good forecaster right? Does it seem right to you that a panel of good forecasters would come to something like Will’s view, rather than the median FHI view?
I’ll speak for the consensus when I say I think there’s not a clear way to decide if this is correct without actually doing it—and the outcome would depend a lot on what level of engagement the superforecasters had with these ideas already. (If I got to pick the 5 superforecasters, even excluding myself, I could guarantee it was either closer to FHI’s viewpoints, or to Will’s.) Even if we picked from a “fair” reference class, if I could have them spend 2 weeks at FHI talking to people there, I think a reasonable proportion would be convinced—though perhaps this is less a function of updating neutrally towards correct ideas as it is the emergence of consensus in groups.
Lastly, I have tremendous respect for Will, but I don’t know that he’s calibrated particularly well to make a prediction like this. (Not that I know he isn’t—I just don’t have any reason to think he’s spent much time working on this skillset.)