Upvoted because I think it’s a good community norm for people to call each other out on things like this.
However, with the rapid upvoting, and human attention span being what it is, I’m a bit worried that for many readers the main takeaway of this post will be something not far from “Nick Beckstead = bad”. So in an effort to balance things out a bit in our lizard brains...
Ode to Nick Beckstead
I personally can’t think of anyone I’d attribute more credit to for directing funding towards AI Safety work (and in the likely case that I’m wrong, I’d still be surprised if Nick wasn’t in the top handful of contributors)
Nick was an EA before it was cool, founding trustee of CEA, helped launch the first Giving What We Can student groups, helped launch The Life You Can Save etc.
Rob Wiblin calls him “one of the smartest people I know” with “exceptional judgement”
On top of all the public information, in private I’ve found him to be impressively even-handed in his thinking and dealings with people, and one of the most emotionally supportive people I’ve known in EA. [Edit, h/t Michelle_Hutchinson: Disclaimer: I work for an EA community-building organisation that was offered an EA Community Grant last month by CEA.]
Indeed, in no way should any of my post be taken to be reflective of Nick’s character in any way. It’s just Nick was the fund manager of both the funds central to my post, and some of the material I directly cited from the EA Funds webpages were written by him. I wasn’t sure how to write it without mentioning Nick a lot, as I thought writing my post with “Prof. Beckstead,” “the fund manager,” or using pronouns everywhere would have been more awkward.
So if I didn’t come out in the tone of my post, it’s my intention the CEA as an organization is responsible to address these concerns. Not only Nick but multiple staff from the CEA were involved in providing communications which, as I laid out in my post, paint a contradictory picture of what within the CEA different people thought the Funds would be used. This is on top of the multiple concerns Henry Stanley, myself and others have raised in the last several months regarding the EA Funds, and those concerns not (until now) being addressed for the EA Community and Long-Term Future Funds.
I found Nick’s response adequate, and I thanked him for updating the EA Funds now. However, as I also responded to Nick, and based on other comments’, that alone doesn’t address why things have gotten to this point in the first place. Based on an expectation the EA Community and Long-Term Future Funds already would have been more transparent and accountable than they’ve been so far, as the other two funds have been, there are concerns regarding effectiveness to be addressed. I intend to try following up with the CEA to address these concerns.
Upvoted because I think it’s a good community norm for people to call each other out on things like this.
However, with the rapid upvoting, and human attention span being what it is, I’m a bit worried that for many readers the main takeaway of this post will be something not far from “Nick Beckstead = bad”. So in an effort to balance things out a bit in our lizard brains...
Ode to Nick Beckstead
I personally can’t think of anyone I’d attribute more credit to for directing funding towards AI Safety work (and in the likely case that I’m wrong, I’d still be surprised if Nick wasn’t in the top handful of contributors)
Nick was an EA before it was cool, founding trustee of CEA, helped launch the first Giving What We Can student groups, helped launch The Life You Can Save etc.
Rob Wiblin calls him “one of the smartest people I know” with “exceptional judgement”
On top of all the public information, in private I’ve found him to be impressively even-handed in his thinking and dealings with people, and one of the most emotionally supportive people I’ve known in EA. [Edit, h/t Michelle_Hutchinson: Disclaimer: I work for an EA community-building organisation that was offered an EA Community Grant last month by CEA.]
Indeed, in no way should any of my post be taken to be reflective of Nick’s character in any way. It’s just Nick was the fund manager of both the funds central to my post, and some of the material I directly cited from the EA Funds webpages were written by him. I wasn’t sure how to write it without mentioning Nick a lot, as I thought writing my post with “Prof. Beckstead,” “the fund manager,” or using pronouns everywhere would have been more awkward.
So if I didn’t come out in the tone of my post, it’s my intention the CEA as an organization is responsible to address these concerns. Not only Nick but multiple staff from the CEA were involved in providing communications which, as I laid out in my post, paint a contradictory picture of what within the CEA different people thought the Funds would be used. This is on top of the multiple concerns Henry Stanley, myself and others have raised in the last several months regarding the EA Funds, and those concerns not (until now) being addressed for the EA Community and Long-Term Future Funds.
I found Nick’s response adequate, and I thanked him for updating the EA Funds now. However, as I also responded to Nick, and based on other comments’, that alone doesn’t address why things have gotten to this point in the first place. Based on an expectation the EA Community and Long-Term Future Funds already would have been more transparent and accountable than they’ve been so far, as the other two funds have been, there are concerns regarding effectiveness to be addressed. I intend to try following up with the CEA to address these concerns.