it asks where should that person put his money, not what kind of tech he should invent
A nontrivial chunk of EA is allocating money to tech invention, though, especially if you consider institutions and institutional design to be social tech.
Open borders advocacy, for example, would probably translate to infrastructure investments in the 1400s. (Build more lighthouses, map out channels, build and guard more roads, set up mail links, etc.)
But yeah, GiveDirectly would have an obvious analog in 1400. And SCI, if you were able to somehow transmit the ‘pathogens and parasites cause disease and can be fixed by sanitation’ idea along with it, seems like it could be tremendously useful. Inoculation, for example, could be moved up a century globally (and ~4 centuries in Europe).
You’re still trying to answer the question of “what is the most useful knowledge I can pass down to 1400”. That’s a different question.
Here all you can do is say “You should put your money in X” and no, you can’t explain why X is important. “Build more lighthouses” is a valid answer, yes, but doesn’t that imply that EA should be concerned with the success of commerce?
Here all you can do is say “You should put your money in X” and no, you can’t explain why X is important.
That’s not the prompt—the prompt is:
If you taught the principles of effective altruism to a rich person in (say) 1400, what would they have thought was the most effective thing to do with their money?
But what are the “principles of effective altruism”? If they’re something like “use science to determine which charitable opportunities best achieve your values,” then we can’t teach them to a rich person in 1400 without teaching them what we mean by “science.” If it’s something like “rank charitable opportunities by marginal value,” then it has to include a definition of marginal value.
If it’s just “don’t privilege your local area, don’t give for affiliation reasons, look for where your gifts can do the most good,” then yeah, you’re probably just going to see them funding missionaries when they should be investing in capitalism and science and infrastructure.
doesn’t that imply that EA should be concerned with the success of commerce?
What do you think GiveDirectly and/or open borders EAs do?
Yes, fair point. But you don’t need to teach someone science to convey the message of EA. The message is basically “Apply your money to where it will do the most good, as best as you can determine”. You can add a few negatives (“don’t give to raise your status”, “don’t give to what tugs at your heart the hardest”, etc.) and they will still be easily understood by a XV-century person.
What do you think GiveDirectly and/or open borders EAs do?
I think they concern themselves with welfare of people and not with success of commerce.
A nontrivial chunk of EA is allocating money to tech invention, though, especially if you consider institutions and institutional design to be social tech.
Open borders advocacy, for example, would probably translate to infrastructure investments in the 1400s. (Build more lighthouses, map out channels, build and guard more roads, set up mail links, etc.)
But yeah, GiveDirectly would have an obvious analog in 1400. And SCI, if you were able to somehow transmit the ‘pathogens and parasites cause disease and can be fixed by sanitation’ idea along with it, seems like it could be tremendously useful. Inoculation, for example, could be moved up a century globally (and ~4 centuries in Europe).
You’re still trying to answer the question of “what is the most useful knowledge I can pass down to 1400”. That’s a different question.
Here all you can do is say “You should put your money in X” and no, you can’t explain why X is important. “Build more lighthouses” is a valid answer, yes, but doesn’t that imply that EA should be concerned with the success of commerce?
That’s not the prompt—the prompt is:
But what are the “principles of effective altruism”? If they’re something like “use science to determine which charitable opportunities best achieve your values,” then we can’t teach them to a rich person in 1400 without teaching them what we mean by “science.” If it’s something like “rank charitable opportunities by marginal value,” then it has to include a definition of marginal value.
If it’s just “don’t privilege your local area, don’t give for affiliation reasons, look for where your gifts can do the most good,” then yeah, you’re probably just going to see them funding missionaries when they should be investing in capitalism and science and infrastructure.
What do you think GiveDirectly and/or open borders EAs do?
Yes, fair point. But you don’t need to teach someone science to convey the message of EA. The message is basically “Apply your money to where it will do the most good, as best as you can determine”. You can add a few negatives (“don’t give to raise your status”, “don’t give to what tugs at your heart the hardest”, etc.) and they will still be easily understood by a XV-century person.
I think they concern themselves with welfare of people and not with success of commerce.