TLDR: Take the population ethics quiz here: https://mdickens.me/pop-ethics/
Population ethics is an oft-overlooked subfield within ethics. Many people hold views that they don't realize contradict each other, or that have strange implications that they wouldn't endorse if they thought about it more.
Not just that—population ethics is a BIG DEAL. A lot of ethical decisions hinge on how you think about changes in future populations....
A preliminary estimate, and a request for better ones.
Summary
I believe the standard literature estimates for the number of DALYs attributable to a case of stunting are too low, largely because they don’t account for the long term effects. This means that childhood nutritional interventions that reduce the prevalence of stunting may be substantially more cost-effective than previously believed.
Epistemic status
Exploratory and back-o...
I’ve been feeling pretty shaken since the METR report about the Hugging Face incident came out last week. Over the weekend, I wrote up some thoughts on how lonely the AI situation sometimes feels to me. It’s more personal than what I’d usually share publicly, but I thought I’d post it here in case it resonates with anyone else.
I’m very grateful to the man...
What is EA's stance on Gain-of-Function Research? (OC)
I recently interviewed a Columbia University parasitologist on GOF research. I picked him, in part, because he was strongly in favor of conducting GOF. According to him, the risks are minimal, and the benefits far outweigh them.
I'm not a scientist (obviously), but I can't say I agree with the entirety of his argument on the risks. Smallpox has been released from the lab 3 times, so we know that human error has allowed a deadly virus to escape from a lab and kill people.
It's pretty obvious that GOF has a lot of upsides though. Many scientists studying it are conducting this research explicitly to prevent pandemics in the future.
It doesn't seem obvious to me which route will produce the least risk.
Maybe we should send all scientists doing this kind of research into a quarantine bubble, and have them do 6 weeks on/6 weeks off shifts. Other than that, I'm out of ideas.
Clip of the interview if you're interested: