I founded All In Labs, a for-profit venture studio.
Iām based in London and interested in AI safety, forecasting, community building, rationality, mental health, games, running and probably other stuff.
Before I was a programmer I was a professional poker player, where I picked up the habit of calculating the EV of almost every action in my life, and subsequently discovered EA.
If you want to learn more about me, you can check out my website here: https://āājonnyspicer.com
CE Incubated Charities Fund & RP
Tanaka Toshiko and Ogawa Tadayoshi, both Hibakusha (survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings) spoke at the closing ceremony for EAG London this year, although I couldnāt find any explicit link between themselves and Nihon Hidankyo.
Have you considered talking/āworking with Sage on this? It sounds like something that would fit well with the other tools on https://āāwww.quantifiedintuitions.org/āā
Iād be interested to see you weigh the pros and cons of making it easier to contributeāyou donāt explicitly say it in the post, but you imply that this would be a good thing by default. The forum is the way it is for a reason, and there are mechanisms put in place both by the forum team and by the community in order to try to keep the quality of the discussion high.
For example, I would argue that having a high bar for posting isnāt a bad thing, and the sliding-scale karma system that helps regulate that is, in extension, valuable. If writing a full post of sufficient quality is time consuming, then there is the quick takes section.
The Alignment Forum has a significantly higher barrier to entry than this one does, but I think that is fairly universally regarded as an important factor in facilitating a certain kind of discussion either. I can see a lot of value in the EA forum trying to maintain itās current norms in order to mean it still has the potential for productive discussion between people who are sufficiently well-researched. I think meaningfully lowering the bar for participation would mean that the forum would lose some of its ability to generate anything especially novel or useful to the community and I think the quote you included:
For an internet forum itās pretty good. But itās still an internet forum. Not many good discussions happen on the internet.
Somewhat points to that too. I think there should be other forums for people less familiar with EA to participate in discussions, and I think whether or not those currently exist is an interesting discussion.
Having said all that, I do wonder if that leaves the current forum community particularly vulnerable to groupthink. Iām not really sure what the solution to that is though.
My biggest takeaway from EA so far has been that the difference in expected moral value between the consensus choice and its alternative(s) can be vastly larger than I had previously thought.
I used to think that ācommon senseā would get me far when it came to moral choices. I even thought that the difference in expected moral value between the ācommon senseā choice and any alternatives was negligible, so much so that I made a deliberate decision not to invest time into thinking about my own values or ethics.
EA radically changed my opinion, and now I hold the view that the consensus view is frequently wrong, even when the stakes are high, and that is possible to make dramatically better moral decisions by approaching them with rationality, and a better-informed ethical framework.
Sometimes I come across people who are familiar with EA ideas but donāt particularly engage with them or the community. I often feel surprised, and I think the above is a big part of why. Perhaps more emphasis could be placed on this expected moral value gap in EA outreach?
Thanks for the feedbackāit has indeed been a long time since I did high school statistics!
I specified that the numbers I gave were āapproximations to prove my pointā is because I know that I do not have a technical statistical model in my head, and I didnāt want to pretend that was the case. Given this is a non-technical, shortform post, I thought it was clear what I meantāapologies if that wasnāt so.
This is a good idea, thanks for the suggestion! Iāve never really tried any of the CFAR stuff but this seems like a good place to start.
Iāll give it a go over the weekend and if Iām struggling then Iāll let you know and we can do it together :)
It means something like āmy 90% confidence interval is 80% ā 95%, with 90% as the meanā.
Thanks for the suggestion! I have actually spent quite a lot of time thinking about thisāI had my 80k call last April and this was their advice. Iāve hesitated against doing this for a number of reasons:
Iām worried that even if I do upskill in ML, I wonāt be a good enough software engineer to land a research engineering position, so part of me wants to improve as a SWE first
At the moment Iām very busy and a marginal hour of my time is very valuable, upskilling in ML is likely 200-500 hours, at the moment I would struggle to commit to even 5 hours per week
I donāt know whether I would enjoy ML, whereas I know I somewhat enjoy at least some parts of the SWE work I currently do
Learning ML potentially narrows my career options vs learning broader skills, so itās hard to hedge
My impression is that there are a lot of people trying to do this right now, and itās not clear to me that doing so would be my comparative advantage. Perhaps carving out a different niche would be more valuable in the future.
There are probably good rebuttals to at least some of these points, and I think that is adding to my confusion. My intuition is to keep doing what Iām currently doing, rather than go try and learn ML, but maybe my intuition here is bad.
Edit: writing this comment made me realise that I ought to write a proper doc with the pros/ācons of learning ML and get feedback on it if necessary. Thanks for helping pull this useful thought out of my brain :)
I suffer strongly from the following, and I suspect many EAs do too (all numbers are to approximations to illustrate my point):
I think that AGI is coming within the next 50 years, 90% probability, with medium confidence
I think that there is a ~10% chance that development of AGI leads to catastrophic outcomes for humanity, with very low confidence
I think there is a ~50% chance that development of AGI leads to massive amounts of flourishing for humanity, with very low confidence
Increasing my confidence in points 2 & 3 seems very difficult and time consuming, as the questions at hand are exceptionally complex, and even identifying personal cruxes will be a challenge
I feel a moral obligation to prevent catastrophes and enable flourishing, where I have the influence to do so
I want to take actions that accurately reflect my values
Given the probabilities above, not taking strong, if not radical, action to try to influence the outcomes feels like a failure to embody my values, and a moral failure.
Iām still figuring out what to do about this. When youāre highly uncertain itās obviously fine to hedge against being wrong, but again, given the numbers itās hard to justify hedging all the way down to inaction.
I am trying to learn more about AI safety, but Iām not spending very much time on it currently. Iām trying to talk to others about it, but Iām not evangelising it, nor necessarily speaking with a great sense of urgency. At the moment, itās low down my de factor priority list, even though I think thereās a significant chance it changes everything I know and care about. Is part of this a lack of visceral connection to the risks and rewards? What can I do to feel like my values are in line with my actions?
The CEO has been inconsistent over time regarding his position on releasing LLMs
I find this to be a pretty poor criticism, and its inclusion makes me less inclined to accept the other criticisms in this piece at face value.
Updating your beliefs and changing your mind in light of new evidence is undoubtedly a good thing. To say that doing so leaves you with concerns about Connorās ātrustworthiness and characterā seems not only unfair, but also creates a disincentive for people to publicly update their views on key issues, for fear of this kind of criticism.
Iād recommend having a strategy for planning your conference
Different types of 1:1s are valuable in different ways, and some are more worth preparing for than others
Itās natural to feel imposter syndrome and a sense of inadequacy when surrounded by so many highly competent, accomplished people, but arguably the primary purpose of the conference is for those people to help us mere mortals become highly competent and accomplished too (assuming accomplishment = impact)
I feel very conflicted about the insider/āoutsider nature of the EA community, and Iām going to keep thinking and talking about it more
Last year I attended EAG SF (but not EAG London 2022), and was newer to the EA community, as well as working for a less prestigious organisation. This context is probably important for many of these reflections.
I made some improvements to my conference planning strategy this year, that I think made the experience significantly better:
I looked through the attendee list and sent out meeting invitations as soon as Swapcard was available. This way people had more slots free, both increasing their likelihood of accepting my meeting, and increasing the chances theyāll accept for the specific time Iāve requested. This let me have more control over my schedule.
I left half an hourās break in between my 1:1s. This allowed meetings to go on longer if both participants wanted that, as well as gave me some time to process information, write down notes, and recharge.
I initially didnāt schedule many meetings on Sunday. This meant that if anybody I talked to on Friday or Saturday suggested I talk to someone else at the conference, Iād have the best chance at being able to arrange a meeting with them on Sunday. This strategy worked really well, as I had a couple of particularly valuable 1:1s on Sunday with people who hadnāt originally been on my radar to talk to.
I had a clearer sense of what I was trying to achieve out of the conference this year compared to last. This made it easier to decide who would be valuable to speak to. Everyone who I requested a meeting with accepted, including someone who I regarded as particularly impressive who had specified they werenāt going to take many 1:1sāso have a low bar for requesting meetings! With this person in particular I felt a bit starstruck, and regretted not having spent more time preparing specific questions to ask.
Some other meetings were totally fine without preparation though, so I think itās worth considering which ones would be more valuable to prepare forāin my case these were ones with more accomplished folks, or with people who Iām interested in working/ācollaborating with in the near future.
I broadly had two kinds of 1:1s, both of which were valuable: meetings with people who had a track record in areas that I am considering pursuing, and meetings with people who are in a similar position to me currently. With the former, I had specific questions that I was trying to answer, and was potentially trying to impress them/āgauge if they might hire me. With the latter, meetings were more exploratory, more casual, and more about trying to find out if I was missing anything important from my model. I think itās easy to feel like the former is far more valuable than the latter, but I think this is false, and I think scheduling some of these more relaxed meetings can help ease the stress of the conference (as well as provide valuable insight into your current situation and plans).
Last year, I felt like I had something to prove in all of my meetings. I knew maybe 4-5 people who were at the conference, which is not a lot out of almost 1500, and I worked for a company that nobody in SF has heard of. I was still a prototypical EA (straight white male) in many ways, but I donāt have an undergrad, and felt like I lacked any track record of achievements to show that I was competent (and by extension, worthy of other attendeesā time).
This year, I had several close friends attending and had interacted with a much larger number of people in some capacity, either on social media or through EA tech events in London. I now work for a FAANG company. I have read the seminal Slate Star Codex posts, I broadly understand what a deceptively aligned mesa optimiser is, and Iāve speculated as to the true identity of Qualy the Lightbulb on Twitter. I have a legible track record of my competence, and I am fluent in EA jargon. I have infiltrated the ingroup.
I feel very conflicted about thisābeing part of the ingroup feels great. I feel like I have the respect of people who I view as being extremely talented and successful, and naturally this does wonders for my ego. Having so many common touchpoints has meant that I find it extremely easy to make meaningful connections within the EA community compared with outside. Using jargon to signal that your familiar with the relevant scriptures and ideas lets you skip straight to discussing cruxes, on the understanding that both parties already agree on some number of issues. Other group norms, such as a preference for openness, directness, and epistemic humility also seem better than their alternatives to meāI think these tendencies facilitate more constructive discussion, ultimately (hopefully) leading to greater impact.
But there are many obvious drawbacks to this. The ingroup is primarily made up of exceptionally privileged people (and in some ways Iām glad of thisāI want privileged people like myself to be doing more to think about how they can do good with their privilege), and often the people that feel less comfortable around the EA community are less privileged. Other people have articulated these problems with the community better than me, and I donāt want to speak for them so wonāt go into too much detail, but if youāre reading this then you probably already know exactly what I mean. The fact that the EA community makes some people feel this way makes me feel really sad, which is hard to square with the happiness I get from the sense of belonging that I personally feel from the community.
Iām not entirely sure what to do about this. Trying to use less jargon seems like a good start, but that would be a costly signal for me, particularly when I feel like I am starting to gain status within the community. I would love to write that I am happy to sacrifice this, but I am human and flawed, and I donāt know if I am. Making a conscious effort to treat people the same, regardless of whether I view them as highly accomplished or not, also seems like something I ought to write here, but seems hard (or even impossible) to do in practice.
80k has the idea of spending the initial part of your career acquiring career capital, which can later be traded in for impact. Perhaps EA ought to have the idea of community capitalāa greater focus is placed on nurturing and growing a healthy community focused on doing good. Even if this focus detracts from doing the absolute most good possible in the short term, in the long term it could allow for greater impact (and, after all, we do love talking about the long term round here).
I feel like my thinking on these topics is generally pretty immature and lacks nuance, so Iād welcome any thoughts.
To end on a positive note, I found the conference incredibly valuable. I came away feeling like I had three promising paths to explore, and am now planning on trying to move to direct work immediately, rather than gaining more career capital as originally planned. I feel excited about trying to use my career to do good, and I feel excited about EA as a whole. There are jobs I will apply for that I counterfactually wouldnāt have, seemingly promising opportunities for collaboration, and I made several new contacts that I think will be mutually beneficial in the future.
The conference itself seemed excellently run, the venue was amazing, as was the food, and I feel very appreciative for both the organisers and event staff for all their time and effort!
Related (and IMO excellent) blog post that you might find interesting: https://āāwww.benkuhn.net/āāabyss/āā
If Isaac has already spent that much money on mana, it seems to me like it could be addictive behaviour and shouldnāt be encouraged.
Also he might well donate his winnings too.
I am confused by this claimāthe graph above it suggests that 64% of Bluesky claims were classified as somewhat negative, and only 15% of Bluesky claims were classified as very negative. While I agree with your analysis that the sentiment on Bluesky skews a lot more negative than that on Truth Social, I do think itās notable that a greater proportion of Truth Social posts were very negative in sentiment as compared to Bluesky posts.