Quick takes
There are a number of implicit concepts I have in my head that seem so obvious that I don't even bother verbalizing them. At least, until it's brought to my attention other people don't share these concepts.
It didn't feel like a big revelation at the time I learned the concept, just a formalization of something that's extremely obvious. And yet other people don't have those intuitions, so perhaps this is pretty non-obvious in reality.
Here’s a short, non-exhaustive list:
- Intermediate Value Theorem
- Net Present Value
- Differentiable functions are locally linear
- Th
Hey y'all,
My TikTok algorithm recently presented me with this video about effective altruism, with over 100k likes and (TikTok claims) almost 1 million views. This isn't a ridiculous amount, but it's a pretty broad audience to reach with one video, and it's not a particularly kind framing to EA. As far as criticisms go, it's not the worst, it starts with Peter Singer's thought experiment and it takes the moral imperative seriously as a concept, but it also frames several EA and EA-adjacent activities negatively, saying EA quote "has an enormously well fund...
I actually share a lot of your read here. I think it is actually a very strong explanation of Singer's argument (the shoes-for-suit swap is a nice touch), and the observation about the motivation for AI safety warrants engagement rather than dismissal.
My one quibble with the video's content is the "extreme utilitarians" framing; as I'm one of maybe five EA virtue ethicists, I bristle a bit at the implication that EA requires utilitarianism, and in this context it reads as dismissive. It's a pretty minor issue though.
I think that the video is still wo...
Quick Pitch for Using Toggl
- Reduces task switching:
- Actively changing the task in Toggl makes you more aware of switching.
- Helps maintain focus on one task longer.
- For small or miscellaneous tasks, I use grouped categories (e.g. "Smalls", "Slack/email") and batch them.
- Tracks time against priorities:
- Allows reflection on whether your actual time spent aligns with your intended priorities.
- Easy to spot when too much time is going to low-priority tasks.
- Improves time estimation:
- Over time, you get calibrated on how long tasks really take.
- Some tasks consis
100% agree. For those that can't build the habit with toggle, try DoneThat. Same benefits except for the first point!
Man, I was just re-reading the 'why I donate' posts while compiling the Digest. Some really beautiful sentiments in there.
I grew up in a deeply ironic and uncaring culture (i.e. I went to an all boys school). I didn't like it! It means a lot to me to be in a community now where people can write such heartfelt and authentic posts.
Some of my favourites:
- Lorenzo's post, for a great articulation of money considered as a vote: "€1.70 votes to be allocated into a slice of pizza for Lorenzo" or "$5.85 votes for an insecticide-treated bednet for a famil
Announcing: 2026 MIRI Technical Governance Team Research Fellowship.
MIRI’s Technical Governance Team plans to run a small research fellowship program in early 2026. The program will run for 8 weeks, and include a $1200/week stipend. Fellows are expected to work on their projects 40 hours per week. The program is remote-by-default, with an in-person kickoff week in Berkeley, CA (flights and housing provided). Participants who already live in or near Berkeley are free to use our office for the duration of the program.
Fellows will spend the first week picking...
EAs are trying to win the "attention arms race" by not playing. I think this could be a mistake.
- The founding ideas and culture of EA was created and “grew up” in the early 2010s, when online content consumption looked very different.
- We’ve overall underreacted to shifts in the landscape of where people get ideas and how they engage with them.
- As a result, we’ve fallen behind, and should consider making a push to bring our messaging and content delivery mechanisms in line with 2020s consumption.
- Also, EA culture is dispositionally calm, rational, and dry.
- Th
The Ezra Klein Show (one of my favourite podcasts) just released an episode with GiveWell CEO Elie Hassenfeld!
Idea for someone with a bit of free time:
While I don't have the bandwidth for this atm, someone should make a public (or private for, say, policy/reputation reasons) list of people working in (one or multiple of) the very neglected cause areas — e.g., digital minds (this is a good start), insect welfare, space governance, AI-enabled coups, and even AI safety (more for the second reason than others). Optional but nice-to-have(s): notes on what they’re working on, time contributed, background, sub-area, and the rough rate of growth in the field (you pr...
I’ve seen a few people in the LessWrong community congratulate the community on predicting or preparing for covid-19 earlier than others, but I haven’t actually seen the evidence that the LessWrong community was particularly early on covid or gave particularly wise advice on what to do about it. I looked into this, and as far as I can tell, this self-congratulatory narrative is a complete myth.
Many people were worried about and preparing for covid in early 2020 before everything finally snowballed in the second week of March 2020. I remember it personally....
Following up a bit on this, @parconley. The second post in Zvi's covid-19 series is from 6pm Eastern on March 13, 2020. Let's remember where this is in the timeline. From my quick take above:
...On March 8, 2020, Italy put a quarter of its population under lockdown, then put the whole country on lockdown on March 10. On March 11, the World Health Organization declared covid-19 a global pandemic. (The same day, the NBA suspended the season and Tom Hanks publicly disclosed he had covid.) On March 12, Ohio closed its schools statewide. The U.S. declared a nationa
Reading Will's post about the future of EA (here) I think that there is an option also to "hang around and see what happens". It seems valuable to have multiple similar communities. For a while I was more involved in EA, then more in rationalism. I can imagine being more involved in EA again.
A better earth would build a second suez canal, to ensure that we don't suffer trillions in damage if the first one gets stuck. Likewise, having 2 "think carefully about things movements" seems fine.
It hasn't always felt like this "two is better than one" feeling...
Well, the evidence is there if you're ever curious. You asked for it, and I gave it.
David Thorstad, who writes the Reflective Altruism blog, is a professional academic philosopher and, until recently, was a researcher at the Global Priorities Institute at Oxford. He was an editor of the recent Essays on Longtermism anthology published by Oxford University Press, which includes an essay co-authored by Will MacAskill, as well as essays by a few other people well-known in the effective altruism community and the LessWrong community. He has a number of publish...
Hi, does anyone from the US want to donation-swap with me to a German tax-deductible organization? I want to donate $2410 to the Berkeley Genomics Project via Manifund.
it's quite easy, I actually already did it with printful + shopify. I stalled out because (1) I realized it's much more confusing to deal with all the copyright stuff and stepping on toes (I don't want to be competing with ea itself or ea orgs and didn't feel like coordinating with a bunch of people. (2) you kind of get raked using a easy fully automated stack. Not a big deal but with shipping hoodies end up being like 35-40 and t shirts almost 20. I felt like given the size of EA we should probably just buy a heat press or embroidery machine since w...
A quick OpenAI-o1 preview BOTEC for additional emissions from a sort of Leopold scenario ~2030, assuming energy is mostly provided by natural gas, since I was kinda curious. Not much time spent on this and took the results at face value. I (of course?) buy that emissions don't matter in short term, in a world where R&D is increasingly automated and scaled.
Phib: Say an additional 20% of US electricity was added to our power usage (e.g. for AI) over the next 6 years, and it was mostly natural gas. Also, that AI inference is used at an increasing rate, sa...
I live in Australia, and am interested in donating to the fundraising efforts of MIRI and Lightcone Infrastructure, to the tune of $2,000 USD for MIRI and $1,000 USD for Lightcone. Neither of these are tax-advantaged for me. Lightcone is tax advantaged in the US, and MIRI is tax advantaged in a few countries according to their website.
Anyone want to make a trade, where I donate the money to a tax-advantaged charity in Australia that you would otherwise donate to, and you make these donations? As I understand it, anything in Effective Altruism Austral...
Londoners!
@Gemma 🔸 is hosting a co-writing session this Sunday, for people who would like to write "Why I Donate" posts. The plan is to work in poms, and publish something during the session.
A semi-regular reminder that anybody who wants to join EA (or EA adjacent) online book clubs, I'm your guy.
Copying from a previous post:
...I run some online book clubs, some of which are explicitly EA and some of which are EA-adjacent: one on China as it relates to EA, one on professional development for EAs, and one on animal rights/welfare/advocacy. I don't like self-promoting, but I figure I should post this at least once on the EA Forum so that people can find it if they search for "book club" or "reading group." Details, including links for joining each
In Development, a global development-focused magazine founded by Lauren Gilbert, has just opened their first call for pitches. They are looking for 2-4k word stories about things happening in the developing world. They're especially excited about pitches from people living in low and middle income countries. They pay 2k USD per article, submissions close Jan 12. More info here