I’m a medical doctor, co-founder of EA Denmark, and author.
I recently concluded a research project on biosecurity at Stanford and the CDC and I’m now looking for impactful ways of furthering the EA community.
I also care a lot about developing altruistic talent and help them to reach impactful positions via personal development and education. Some years ago, I wrote a book on effective learning and worked as a lecturer where I created a course on the topic for medical students.
Yes, that’s why I find my initial reasoning unnuanced. Upon slightly further reflection, it seems obvious that his wealth and dedication have enabled a lot of good initiatives and I frequently see initiatives crediting Gates.
However, would you break that impact further down? Some quick approaches that I can think of:
i) Simply use the heuristic of money pledged ~ impact (“wow, that’s a lot of money. That has to be super impactful”.)
ii) Look into the causes supported in order to adjust the donations to the impact of actual causes supported.
iii) Go with the heuristic of if we have repeatedly heard someone (or something) being credited for his/her impact, then he/she must be very impactful.