michel

• michel 21 Aug 2025 5:20 UTC

  3 points

  1 ∶ 0

  on: Effec­tive Altru­ism: An Unmanifesto

  Helpful post! Especially liked this comment with respect to how EA is defined and what a more helpful definition can include:

  Most definitions of effective altruism are unsatisfying, because their goal is primarily persuasive: their purpose is to get you to become an effective altruist [...]
  
  This post series defines effective altruism in a way that’s anthropological. What do effective altruists believe that other people tend not to believe? Why do they believe that? What do the vegans and the kidney donors, the AI safety researchers and the randomized controlled trial lovers, have in common?

• michel 21 Aug 2025 5:08 UTC

  4 points

  0 ∶ 0

  on: Deep Democ­racy as a promis­ing tar­get for pos­i­tive AGI futures

  Nice post. I’ve been vaguely thinking in this direction so it’s helpful to have a name for this idea and some early food for thought.

• michel 21 Feb 2025 1:15 UTC

  14 points

  3 ∶ 0

  in reply to: titotal’s comment on: The Case for Jour­nal­ism on AI

  I think this is really fair pushback, thanks! Skeptical coverage of AI development is legitimate. I think the way I wrote this over-implied that these articles is a failing of journalism—the marketing hype claim is not baseless.

  But I’m torn. I still think there’s something off about current AI coverage, and this could be a valid reason to want more journalism on AI. Most articles seem to default to either full embrace of AI companies’ claims or blanket skepticism, with relatively few spotlighting the strongest version of arguments on both sides of a debate.
  
  Also, I think my core point stands without conditioning on object-level views: we need more journalists who can dig deep into AI development. More investigation and scrutiny from all angles would serve us better than our current situation of relatively thin coverage.

The Case for Jour­nal­ism on AI

• michel 8 Jan 2025 17:49 UTC

  4 points

  0 ∶ 0

  in reply to: Sarah Cheng 🔸’s comment on: The EA Op­por­tu­nity Board is back

  Thank you!

  Also, I back your earlier sentiment that there’s probably loads of other UI/​UX improvements to be made, although of course I understand if those aren’t a priority.

• michel 8 Jan 2025 16:29 UTC

  4 points

  0 ∶ 0

  in reply to: Sarah Cheng 🔸’s comment on: The EA Op­por­tu­nity Board is back

  It’s been a few years since I worked on the opportunity board so I don’t really remember the decision to add this filter.

  It’s based on this database of EA orgs, which I haven’t kept up to date. (I’m not sure if more recent opportunity board contributors have). I borrowed the language from a similar database Michael A made. Worth noting that both databases were made before or during summer 2022 where EA was much less politicized.

  Looking at it now, I also find this filter a bit weird and would probably advise removing it or making sure it’s up to date and uses language most organizations would endorse.

• michel 8 Jan 2025 16:22 UTC

  19 points

  2 ∶ 0

  on: The EA Op­por­tu­nity Board is back

  Thank you for taking this on!

  This project that was started by motivated university students, sustained by grant funding (thanks Effective Altruism Infrastructure Fund! cc @calebp ), and now ultimately absorbed by a proper organization.

  I like that arc. I think ‘find an organizational home that doesn’t depend on one-off grant funding and unusually dedicated/​risk-tolerant organizers’ is a worthy goal for early-stage project to orient towards. (This can be done either by starting a more mature org on the basis of a good pilot project or joining an org, like the board did here).

• michel 10 Oct 2024 21:52 UTC

  4 points

  0 ∶ 0

  on: An­nounc­ing my de­par­ture from CEA (& shar­ing as­sorted notes)

  I’m really grateful to have worked alongside you! I admire your enthusiasm and careful thinking and am excited to see what you work on next :)

AI and the feel­ing of liv­ing in two worlds

• michel 22 Aug 2024 12:40 UTC

  9 points

  2 ∶ 0

  on: Re­sults of an in­for­mal sur­vey on AI grantmaking

  Interesting that a typical AI journalist is valued more than a typical AI technical researcher (1.2x) and typical AI policy person (1.7x).

Shar­ing the AI Wind­fall: A Strate­gic Ap­proach to In­ter­na­tional Benefit-Sharing

• michel 16 Jul 2024 10:36 UTC

  9 points

  2 ∶ 0

  on: Desta­bi­liza­tion of the United States: The top X-fac­tor EA ne­glects?

  Just an FYI that most non-profits are often legally constrained on doing many sorts of political advocacy work, I think.

• michel 16 Jul 2024 10:12 UTC

  23 points

  5 ∶ 1

  on: Against Aschen­bren­ner: How ‘Si­tu­a­tional Aware­ness’ con­structs a nar­ra­tive that un­der­mines safety and threat­ens humanity

  National securitisation privileges extraordinary measures to defend the nation, often centred around military force and logics of deterrence/​balance of power and defence. Humanity macrosecuritization suggests the object of security is to defend all of humanity, not just the nation, and often invokes logics of collaboration, mutual restraint and constraints on sovereignty.

  I found this distinction really helpful.

  It reminds me of Holden Karnofsky’s piece on How to make the best of the most important century (2021), in which he presents two contrasting frames:

  • The “Caution” frame. In this frame, many of the worst outcomes come from developing something like PASTA in a way that is too fast, rushed, or reckless. We may need to achieve (possibly global) coordination in order to mitigate pressures to race, and take appropriate care. (Caution)

  • The “Competition” frame. This frame focuses not on how and when PASTA is developed, but who (which governments, which companies, etc.) is first in line to benefit from the resulting productivity explosion. (Competition)

  • People who take the “caution” frame and people who take the “competition” frame often favor very different, even contradictory actions. Actions that look important to people in one frame often look actively harmful to people in the other.

    • I worry that the “competition” frame will be overrated by default, and discuss why below. (More)

• michel 3 Jul 2024 17:11 UTC

  9 points

  0 ∶ 0

  on: Ter­mi­nate de­liber­a­tion based on re­silience, not certainty

  FYI, I was making a difficult career decision a few months ago and found this post helpful. Thanks for writing it!

• michel 25 Jun 2024 14:08 UTC

  3 points

  0 ∶ 0

  on: Lov­ing a world you don’t trust

  Love it.

  Your discussion of how ‘Green’ vibes can fall short of really looking consequences in the face reminds of a quote:

  “All that blood was never once beautiful, it was always just red.”—Kait Rokowski

• michel 24 May 2024 9:29 UTC

  3 points

  0 ∶ 0

  on: Policy ad­vo­cacy for erad­i­cat­ing screw­worm looks re­mark­ably cost-effective

  Thanks for sharing this! I’ve really been liking your forum posts recently :)

• michel 30 Apr 2024 12:15 UTC

  2 points

  0 ∶ 0

  in reply to: AnotherAnonymousFTXAccount’s comment on: Per­sonal re­flec­tions on FTX

  Oh sorry, I missed this! I should have read that more closely before commenting.

• michel 19 Apr 2024 8:49 UTC

  4 points

  0 ∶ 0

  in reply to: Nathan Young’s comment on: Per­sonal re­flec­tions on FTX

  Fair enough. Interesting to see people’s different intuitions on this.

• michel 18 Apr 2024 17:24 UTC

  3 points

  7 ∶ 14

  in reply to: AnotherAnonymousFTXAccount’s comment on: Per­sonal re­flec­tions on FTX

  Registering that this line of questioning (and volume of questions) strikes me as a bit off-putting/​ too intense.

  If someone asked about what “What were the key concerns here, and how were they discussed?” [...] “what questions did you ask, and what were the key considerations/​evidence?” about interactions I had years ago, I would feel like they’re holding me to an unrealistic standard of memory or documentation.

  (Although I do acknowledge the mood that these were some really important interactions. Scrutiny is an appropriate reaction, but I still find this off-putting.)

Shar­ing Real­ity with Walt Whit­man [2-min Video]