Another potentially good next step: Just collect relevant sources (as I’ve done for various topics here), or go a little further by making annotated bibliographies (as Vaidehi has done for EA analysess of social movements). One could limit this to just sources by historians, or could include any sources that seem relevant
And another potentially good next step would be to write some sort of literature review, or a collection of semi-polished notes. It might make sense to start small, just reading a few papers, not writing that many pages, and not worrying too much about polish. This could help highlight relevant sources and draw some tentative conclusions about how valuable further work would be. But this also might be an ok end-goal for many topics, as often we might be fine with just summaries of the work that exists and its implications for EA, rather than “original research”.
I’d encourage anyone interested in these topics to consider taking any of those next steps (including writing research proposals)!
Also, regarding the research proposals idea: I happen to have already essentially written research proposals regarding collapse & recovery, moral circle expansion, and sort-of some other topics. These range in length from a few paragraphs to a few pages. They’ve been written with job and grant applications in mind, so I haven’t posted them to the forum yet. But I plan to post them in the coming weeks/months, and I’m happy to share them as they stand with anyone who’s interested. (I have lots of ideas, so if anyone is really excited to pursue something like one of my ideas, I’m happy for them to take that one. Also happy to collaborate, get feedback, etc.)
(Typically I’m not thinking of history alone, but rather some blend of history, psychology, political science, and often other disciplines. But history tends to be in the mix.)
Good list! For next steps, I’d like to see one-pager research proposals, detailing gaps in the literature and the value-added of new work.
Yeah, that seems a good next step to me too.
Another potentially good next step: Just collect relevant sources (as I’ve done for various topics here), or go a little further by making annotated bibliographies (as Vaidehi has done for EA analysess of social movements). One could limit this to just sources by historians, or could include any sources that seem relevant
And another potentially good next step would be to write some sort of literature review, or a collection of semi-polished notes. It might make sense to start small, just reading a few papers, not writing that many pages, and not worrying too much about polish. This could help highlight relevant sources and draw some tentative conclusions about how valuable further work would be. But this also might be an ok end-goal for many topics, as often we might be fine with just summaries of the work that exists and its implications for EA, rather than “original research”.
I’d encourage anyone interested in these topics to consider taking any of those next steps (including writing research proposals)!
Also, regarding the research proposals idea: I happen to have already essentially written research proposals regarding collapse & recovery, moral circle expansion, and sort-of some other topics. These range in length from a few paragraphs to a few pages. They’ve been written with job and grant applications in mind, so I haven’t posted them to the forum yet. But I plan to post them in the coming weeks/months, and I’m happy to share them as they stand with anyone who’s interested. (I have lots of ideas, so if anyone is really excited to pursue something like one of my ideas, I’m happy for them to take that one. Also happy to collaborate, get feedback, etc.)
(Typically I’m not thinking of history alone, but rather some blend of history, psychology, political science, and often other disciplines. But history tends to be in the mix.)