A tag is probably enough, but you could also maybe ask people to put some copy about the contest at the top of each submission?
Why hide stuff from newbies? They are here to see the forum, and this is a cool EA thing happening on the forum.
Max Clarke
I was thinking about this too (and tried to signal it was a question, rather than an answer). But since I think that no one has an answer and it’s more a post designed to spur discussion, I made it a post.
That’s a great point on disagreement on the effectiveness of the interventions themselves (rather than the investments). I’m not really sure how to think about that. I think we do already have a process for figuring out the allocation by hedging against other people’s “intervention portfolios” in the same way as is suggested for investment portfolios below.
For example, if I think LTFF is overemphasizing ai-risk, I can directly donate or offer to fund bio-risk, instead of donating via LTFF.
Are you talking about individuals who are EA, or funds?
Mainly funds, but also individuals (especially wealthy individuals)
Imagine we were coordinating among everyone doing patient philanthropy (patient philanthropy being any situation where you keep wealth instead of liquidating it and giving it away to the current best opportunity that can use the money) and then optimising the overall portfolio. We’re asking the question: In what ways would we choose a different portfolio? I’m just explaining one of the considerations which is the diminishing marginal utility of the whole pool.
[...] bonus points if they can get (legal or informal) commitments from the donors. And then maybe use this information to hedge against individual donors who they believe are making irrational trades, or else are too far out on the risk curve. (Then again should funds devoted to EA have the authority to decide this top-down, or is delegating these choices to donors better?)
I agree, this is exactly what I’m looking for from these comments! This is a pretty reasonable way that we can coordinate on the overall portfolio.
For anyone reading, here’s how this would work. Let’s say Fund X thinks Rich Individual Y is overly bullish on crypto, and that Fund X’s inside view is that EA should only be 20% invested in crypto. Fund X, instead of investing 20% of their funds in crypto, might want to put all their money in other investments instead, to bring the overall EA portfolio closer to 20%.
In general, if people reveal their donation intentions and investment portfolios, we can do a better job hedging against each other to optimise the overall portfolio.
Also, if we come up with a diminishing marginal returns curve, people can judge the optimality of a given portfolio better. @AppliedDivinityStudies has posted a link and thoughts on this part of the discussion.
“[...] afaik EA Funds doesn’t invest their money at all”
Wow—This seems pretty bad, unless in practice all their holding are temporary (ie. They go down to approximately $0 more than once a year). I’m pretty that the optimal portfolio doesn’t include much cash, given that cash appreciates in real value at the wonderful interest rate of negative 2-3% (negative 6% last year?)
Perfect, that’s what I’m looking for
Is EA over-invested in Crypto?
My take: There’s two things we mean by EA:
EA the social group / movement. (EA the people)
EA the project of improving the world.
It’s always ok to leave 1., and it is ok most of the time, but not always, to leave 2.If you are leaving 2., you should try to figure out why. If it’s because you don’t really want to improve the world (like most people), I’d prefer you don’t leave—but I’m fine with it as long as you’re honest about it.
IMO though, people are more likely to leave 2. because:They are burned out or otherwise having a rough time. Take some time off and get back on track :)
They stopped enjoying “EA the social group”. Great, you don’t need us to keep improving the world!
They have other things that are personally more important to them than improving the world (like kids, family, or ideology about open source software). This is totally fine! People need to have good lives of their own!
A quick poll of 105 people at EAG on Friday evening
I didn’t know that thanks—have removed those. I clicked the submit button and saw nothing happen
Yeah I’m not claiming anything much—it was just for fun 😊
I don’t know, and I’m definitely interested if you find out
Hey, if you would like feedback that has more information than being downvoted for vague reasons, I’d be happy to chat.
“We might be the one group best-placed to leverage AI to solve internal coordination problems”.
I listened to this post via the non-linear library and I claim that’s already an example of this.
Project: A web platform for crowdsourcing impact estimates of interventions.
Hi—I think this synergises well with my idea that I’ve just posted here https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/qFPQYM4dfRnE8Cwfx/project-a-web-platform-for-crowdsourcing-impact-estimates-of
Using real donated money instead of fake internet points would make the idea a lot cooler.
Thanks, that’s good feedback. I will check out the linked video. If you know anyone to get in touch with, I’d be keen to talk to them.
My guess is that this idea has been independently thought about many times, and if it’s not bad for some reason, already funded.
I’ve found a similar project by Paal Kvarberg, described in this document here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1An-NGrQUPSJ4v8HdsZO-BcAq5NpyrEqv32rdk-N4guo/edit#
I think he didn’t pursue it—the document hasn’t been updated for a year.
One of the approaches here, is to A) require people sign up, and B) don’t show people aggregated predictions until they have posted their own.
You should post that draft, I’ve been thinking the same stuff and would like to get the conversation started.
I would encourage people to think about this. I think the Thiel fellowship is genius - to motivated, self-driven people, university is almost solely for signalling, because they would learn a greater amount of more important knowledge more efficiently without it. A large prestigious scholarship, especially with the requirement to drop out of university, easily provides the same signalling. Since there are no fees involved, it is also much cheaper to offer (although a big dollar value is a good idea for signalling, so don’t make it too small!), and can maybe be given to more people, who can work without being constrained by the university system. People should of course be selected based on demonstrated ability to work on self-driven projects.