epistemic status: quickly written mini-memo, not Claude-generated
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This is possibly a (good) remnant from my past weightlifting-coaching backgrounds. I found lots of success with adopting this "Coaching" mindset framing going into my mentorship calls, that can strike the "firm but patient" balance:
accountability
so much value of paid coaching clients is from the social accountability of showing up to the scary arena together
where you're coming from as a mentor...
from a place of "i'm rooting for you and i want you to succeed which is why i'm giving you this feedback" and "i believe you can win the Olympic gold medal if you fix xyz"
give concrete pointers
as often as possible, don't be nebulous
eg. say less "go to gym"; say more "show up every Monday at 10am to 11am and do these five workouts, three sets of 10 reps each in this specific order."
points out errors with immediacy;
build a relationship where error-correction is the norm
eg. "[mid-screen share] ... wait wait go back, i think you should remove the picture of Terminator on the poster, because-"
result in: leaving mentees feeling like they worked with (an actual) coach and not someone they just answer to ;)
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...
TL;DR: Kairos has raised $50 million from Coefficient Giving for two years of funding, one of the largest commitments they’ve made towards AI safety fieldbuilding to date. We’re using this to make an ambitious push for growing Kairos, broadening our portfolio of talent infrastructure projects and incubating new organizations. We’ve doubled in size in the last six mon...
