Then there’s the question of how many fields it’s actually important to have good research in. Broadly speaking, my perspective is: we care about the future; the future is going to be influenced by a lot of components; and so it’s important to understand as many of those components as we can. Do we need longtermist sociologists? Hell yes! Then we can better understand how value drift might happen, and what to do about it. Longtermist historians to figure out how power structures will work, longtermist artists to inspire people—as many as we can get. Longtermist physicists—Anders can’t figure out how to colonise the galaxy by himself.
If you’re excited about something that poses a more concrete existential risk, then I’d still advise that as a priority. But my guess is that there’s also a lot of low-hanging fruit for would-be futurists in other disciplines.
Then there’s the question of how many fields it’s actually important to have good research in. Broadly speaking, my perspective is: we care about the future; the future is going to be influenced by a lot of components; and so it’s important to understand as many of those components as we can. Do we need longtermist sociologists? Hell yes! Then we can better understand how value drift might happen, and what to do about it. Longtermist historians to figure out how power structures will work, longtermist artists to inspire people—as many as we can get. Longtermist physicists—Anders can’t figure out how to colonise the galaxy by himself.
If you’re excited about something that poses a more concrete existential risk, then I’d still advise that as a priority. But my guess is that there’s also a lot of low-hanging fruit for would-be futurists in other disciplines.