Then, as the Open Philanthropy Project explored active funding in more areas, its estimate of its own effectiveness grew. After all, it was funding more speculative, hard-to-measure programs...
If I start funding a speculative project because I think it has higher EV than what I’m funding now, then isn’t it rational for me to think my effectiveness has gone up? It seems like you’re implying it’s wrong of them to think that.
but a multi-billion-dollar donor, which was largely relying on the Open Philanthropy Project’s opinions to assess efficacy (including its own efficacy), continued to trust it.
I worry that this might paint a misleading picture to readers who aren’t aware of the close relationship between Good Ventures and GiveWell. This reads to me like the multi-billion-dollar donor is at arm’s length, blindly trusting Open Phil, when in reality Open Phil is a joint venture of GiveWell and Good Ventures (the donor), and they share an office.
If I start funding a speculative project because I think it has higher EV than what I’m funding now, then isn’t it rational for me to think my effectiveness has gone up? It seems like you’re implying it’s wrong of them to think that.
Your EV should go up somewhat, but you shouldn’t take it as a confirmatory track record. You could just be getting more credulous. (Related: Why we can’t take expected value estimates literally (even when they’re unbiased)) I’m not saying it’s wrong to change course and do the thing that seems most effective. That’s obviously the right thing to do. I’m saying that it’s important to track the direction of evidence, and not use your claims as evidence for themselves.
(It’s also important, when you’ve started raising funds for X, and decide that you’d rather do Y, to be very very open and explicit about this to funders, and make sure they understand that you’re not focusing on X anymore.)
when in reality Open Phil is a joint venture of GiveWell and Good Ventures (the donor), and they share an office.
Last time I checked, Good Ventures’s only dedicated staff member was Cari Tuna, its president. So there’s a lot of built-in reliance on Open Phil / GiveWell staff.
If I start funding a speculative project because I think it has higher EV than what I’m funding now, then isn’t it rational for me to think my effectiveness has gone up? It seems like you’re implying it’s wrong of them to think that.
I worry that this might paint a misleading picture to readers who aren’t aware of the close relationship between Good Ventures and GiveWell. This reads to me like the multi-billion-dollar donor is at arm’s length, blindly trusting Open Phil, when in reality Open Phil is a joint venture of GiveWell and Good Ventures (the donor), and they share an office.
Your EV should go up somewhat, but you shouldn’t take it as a confirmatory track record. You could just be getting more credulous. (Related: Why we can’t take expected value estimates literally (even when they’re unbiased)) I’m not saying it’s wrong to change course and do the thing that seems most effective. That’s obviously the right thing to do. I’m saying that it’s important to track the direction of evidence, and not use your claims as evidence for themselves.
(It’s also important, when you’ve started raising funds for X, and decide that you’d rather do Y, to be very very open and explicit about this to funders, and make sure they understand that you’re not focusing on X anymore.)
Last time I checked, Good Ventures’s only dedicated staff member was Cari Tuna, its president. So there’s a lot of built-in reliance on Open Phil / GiveWell staff.