By growing EA, you mean growing longtermist EA? What makes a donation or career longtermist? If you think the longterm benefits of decreasing the risk of human extinction over the next few 10 years are much larger than its nearterm benefits, you should also think the longterm benefits of animal welfare and global health interventions are much larger than their nearterm benefits?
I think most efforts to grow EA grow both Longtermist and non-Longtermist elements of EA. I do agree though that the Longtermist effects of animal welfare are much bigger than near-term benefits.
If so, how do you compare the longterm benefits in a principled way? You estimated “each dollar [donated to longtermist interventions] increases the number of well-off future people in expectation by 10^26”, and GiveWell’s top charities save around 2*10^-4 lives per $ (= 1/(5*10^3)). However, I assume your best guess for the reduction in existential risks would not have to be less than 2*10^-30 (2*10^-4/10^26) times as high, i.e. less than 2*10^-32 pp (instead of your assumption of 0.01 pp), for you to prioritise global health over longtermist interventions.
Yeah, it’s rough and there’s not a perfect method. You just need to use your best judgment. Taking into account moral uncertainty + interchangeability of money, I wouldn’t be that extreme, but I have some credence that something like that extreme of a tradeoff is right.
Are you aware of any quantitative model suggesting this?
Don’t think we need one for those sorts of things, just like we don’t need a quantitative model suggesting, say, the odds of Vance being the next president are around 30%.
GWWC estimated their giving multiplier in 2025 was 7. You linked to an analysis I did of their giving multiplier in 2023-2024. GWWC estimated this was 6, and I got values of 8 to 9.
Oops, dumb, will fix.
I think we’ve talked elsewhere about why I don’t buy that soil nematodes etc make us totally clueless about which animal welfare interventions are good.
I think most efforts to grow EA grow both Longtermist and non-Longtermist elements of EA.
Would it make sense for you to distinguish between growing longtermist and non-longtermist elements of EA? You prioritise longtermist interventions over animal welfare and global health ones.
I do agree though that the Longtermist effects of animal welfare are much bigger than near-term benefits.
Likewise for global health interventions? If so, animal welfare and global health interventions are also longtermist in the sense their longterm benefits are much larger than their nearterm benefits? In this case, it would be better to avoid terms like “Longtermist political donations”, “other Longtermist donations”, and “Longtermist careers”, which could refer to animal welfare and global health interventions? If I thought the longterm effects of the vast majority of interventions were much larger than their nearterm effects, I would simply refer to the areas of the interventions instead of highlighting they are longtermist.
Yeah, it’s rough and there’s not a perfect method.
You did not make any comparison of the longterm benefits of different areas? At this point, I am just looking for one comparison, not a perfect one. Why not defaulting to the basic intuition that the benefits over the next few decades are a good proxy for the total benefits, which suggests global health interventions are more cost-effective than ones aiming to decrease the risk of global catastrophes?
I wouldn’t be that extreme [GiveWell’s top charities being 2*10^-30 times as cost-effective as some longtermist interventions], but I have some credence that something like that extreme of a tradeoff is right.
I doubt GiveWell’s top charities are 2*10^-30 times as cost-effective as some longtermist interventions.
Don’t think we need one for those sorts of things, just like we don’t need a quantitative model suggesting, say, the odds of Vance being the next president are around 30%.
There is huge disagreement about the risk of extinction due to AI. Below are the predictions from superforecasters made in the Existential Risk Persuasion Tournament (XPT). There is nothing like that disagreement about the probability of Vance being the next president of the United States (US) assuming he is one of the 2 final candidates, which makes huge deviations from 50 % extremely unlikely.
I think we’ve talked elsewhere about why I don’t buy that soil nematodes etc make us totally clueless about which animal welfare interventions are good.
The last point I made in my comment was not about this. I meant that global health interventions may be much more cost-effective than animal welfare interventions even neglecting effects on soil invertebrates (like nematodes).
Hey Vasco, always nice to hear from you!
I think most efforts to grow EA grow both Longtermist and non-Longtermist elements of EA. I do agree though that the Longtermist effects of animal welfare are much bigger than near-term benefits.
Yeah, it’s rough and there’s not a perfect method. You just need to use your best judgment. Taking into account moral uncertainty + interchangeability of money, I wouldn’t be that extreme, but I have some credence that something like that extreme of a tradeoff is right.
Don’t think we need one for those sorts of things, just like we don’t need a quantitative model suggesting, say, the odds of Vance being the next president are around 30%.
Oops, dumb, will fix.
I think we’ve talked elsewhere about why I don’t buy that soil nematodes etc make us totally clueless about which animal welfare interventions are good.
Would it make sense for you to distinguish between growing longtermist and non-longtermist elements of EA? You prioritise longtermist interventions over animal welfare and global health ones.
Likewise for global health interventions? If so, animal welfare and global health interventions are also longtermist in the sense their longterm benefits are much larger than their nearterm benefits? In this case, it would be better to avoid terms like “Longtermist political donations”, “other Longtermist donations”, and “Longtermist careers”, which could refer to animal welfare and global health interventions? If I thought the longterm effects of the vast majority of interventions were much larger than their nearterm effects, I would simply refer to the areas of the interventions instead of highlighting they are longtermist.
You did not make any comparison of the longterm benefits of different areas? At this point, I am just looking for one comparison, not a perfect one. Why not defaulting to the basic intuition that the benefits over the next few decades are a good proxy for the total benefits, which suggests global health interventions are more cost-effective than ones aiming to decrease the risk of global catastrophes?
I doubt GiveWell’s top charities are 2*10^-30 times as cost-effective as some longtermist interventions.
There is huge disagreement about the risk of extinction due to AI. Below are the predictions from superforecasters made in the Existential Risk Persuasion Tournament (XPT). There is nothing like that disagreement about the probability of Vance being the next president of the United States (US) assuming he is one of the 2 final candidates, which makes huge deviations from 50 % extremely unlikely.
The last point I made in my comment was not about this. I meant that global health interventions may be much more cost-effective than animal welfare interventions even neglecting effects on soil invertebrates (like nematodes).