Scott has been offered money to quit his job. I don’t know the full reason for why he didn’t take it. I think his observation was what his productivity on his blog doesn’t go up at all if he doesn’t have a job, I think he really values independence from funders, and his job provides him with important grounding that feels important for him to stay sane.
I think his observation was what his productivity on his blog doesn’t go up at all if he doesn’t have a job
(I’m interpreting what you’re saying as “doesn’t go up moderately” not “doesn’t go up at all”.)
That sounds implausible to me. Not having a job would mean more hours are available. Would all of those hours be spent on leisure? Is his “blogging bucket” already filled by the amount of blogging he is currently doing? What about his “doing other productive things” bucket? What about the benefits of having more slack?
As a related point, even if Scott’s productivity wouldn’t benefit from extra hours, I expect that most other people’s productivity would benefit, and ultimately I intend for my point to extend past Scott and Robin and into lots of other cool people (including yourself, actually!).
I think he really values independence from funders
What I am proposing is just “here’s a briefcase of cash, go do what you want”. Ie. no earmarks. So it should provide that independence. This of course requires a lot of trust in the recipient, but I think that for Scott as well as many other people actually, such trust would be justifiable.
and his job provides him with important grounding that feels important for him to stay sane.
It also reminds me of Richard Feynman not wanting a position at the institute for advance study.
“I don’t believe I can really do without teaching. The reason is, I have to have something so that when I don’t have any ideas and I’m not getting anywhere I can say to myself, “At least I’m living; at least I’m doing something; I am making some contribution”—it’s just psychological.
When I was at Princeton in the 1940s I could see what happened to those great minds at the Institute for Advanced Study, who had been specially selected for their tremendous brains and were now given this opportunity to sit in this lovely house by the woods there, with no classes to teach, with no obligations whatsoever. These poor bastards could now sit and think clearly all by themselves, OK? So they don’t get any ideas for a while: They have every opportunity to do something, and they are not getting any ideas. I believe that in a situation like this a kind of guilt or depression worms inside of you, and you begin to worry about not getting any ideas. And nothing happens. Still no ideas come.
Nothing happens because there’s not enough real activity and challenge: You’re not in contact with the experimental guys. You don’t have to think how to answer questions from the students. Nothing!
In any thinking process there are moments when everything is going good and you’ve got wonderful ideas. Teaching is an interruption, and so it’s the greatest pain in the neck in the world. And then there are the longer period of time when not much is coming to you. You’re not getting any ideas, and if you’re doing nothing at all, it drives you nuts! You can’t even say “I’m teaching my class.”
If you’re teaching a class, you can think about the elementary things that you know very well. These things are kind of fun and delightful. It doesn’t do any harm to think them over again. Is there a better way to present them? The elementary things are easy to think about; if you can’t think of a new thought, no harm done; what you thought about it before is good enough for the class. If you do think of something new, you’re rather pleased that you have a new way of looking at it.
The questions of the students are often the source of new research. They often ask profound questions that I’ve thought about at times and then given up on, so to speak, for a while. It wouldn’t do me any harm to think about them again and see if I can go any further now. The students may not be able to see the thing I want to answer, or the subtleties I want to think about, but they remind me of a problem by asking questions in the neighborhood of that problem. It’s not so easy to remind yourself of these things.
So I find that teaching and the students keep life going, and I would never accept any position in which somebody has invented a happy situation for me where I don’t have to teach. Never.”
— Richard Feynman, Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!
I suspect (and this is my interpretation of what he’s said) that Alexander’s productivity would actually go down if he quit his day job. A lot of his blogging is inspired by his psychiatric work, so he would lose that source of inspiration. Also, a lot of his best works (eg. Meditations on Moloch) were written while he was a medical school resident, working 60 hours a week outside of blogging, so it’s not clear to me that the hours of working are really taking away from his best writing. They are certainly taking away from posting as frequently—he’s been posting much more frequently now on Substack—but pressure to write daily posts might take away from work on longer high quality posts.
A lot of his blogging is inspired by his psychiatric work, so he would lose that source of inspiration.
I don’t get the impression that too much is inspired by his psychiatric work. This is partly based on my being a reader of his posts on and off over the years, and also on a brief skim of recent posts (biographies of presidents, AI safety, pregnancy interventions). But even if that source of inspiration was lost, it’d presumably be replaced by other sources of inspiration, and his writing is broad enough where at best that’d be a large net gain and at worst it’d be a small net loss.
Also, a lot of his best works (eg. Meditations on Moloch) were written while he was a medical school resident, working 60 hours a week outside of blogging, so it’s not clear to me that the hours of working are really taking away from his best writing.
That’s a really interesting point. Maybe I’m wrong then. Maybe I don’t understand the subtleties of what makes for good writing. But even so, writing is only one thing. I expect that with more time people like Scott would come up with other cool things to pursue in addition to writing.
Scott has been offered money to quit his job. I don’t know the full reason for why he didn’t take it. I think his observation was what his productivity on his blog doesn’t go up at all if he doesn’t have a job, I think he really values independence from funders, and his job provides him with important grounding that feels important for him to stay sane.
I see, thanks for clarifying.
(I’m interpreting what you’re saying as “doesn’t go up moderately” not “doesn’t go up at all”.)
That sounds implausible to me. Not having a job would mean more hours are available. Would all of those hours be spent on leisure? Is his “blogging bucket” already filled by the amount of blogging he is currently doing? What about his “doing other productive things” bucket? What about the benefits of having more slack?
As a related point, even if Scott’s productivity wouldn’t benefit from extra hours, I expect that most other people’s productivity would benefit, and ultimately I intend for my point to extend past Scott and Robin and into lots of other cool people (including yourself, actually!).
What I am proposing is just “here’s a briefcase of cash, go do what you want”. Ie. no earmarks. So it should provide that independence. This of course requires a lot of trust in the recipient, but I think that for Scott as well as many other people actually, such trust would be justifiable.
That sounds very reasonable to me.
It also reminds me of Richard Feynman not wanting a position at the institute for advance study.
“I don’t believe I can really do without teaching. The reason is, I have to have something so that when I don’t have any ideas and I’m not getting anywhere I can say to myself, “At least I’m living; at least I’m doing something; I am making some contribution”—it’s just psychological.
When I was at Princeton in the 1940s I could see what happened to those great minds at the Institute for Advanced Study, who had been specially selected for their tremendous brains and were now given this opportunity to sit in this lovely house by the woods there, with no classes to teach, with no obligations whatsoever. These poor bastards could now sit and think clearly all by themselves, OK? So they don’t get any ideas for a while: They have every opportunity to do something, and they are not getting any ideas. I believe that in a situation like this a kind of guilt or depression worms inside of you, and you begin to worry about not getting any ideas. And nothing happens. Still no ideas come.
Nothing happens because there’s not enough real activity and challenge: You’re not in contact with the experimental guys. You don’t have to think how to answer questions from the students. Nothing!
In any thinking process there are moments when everything is going good and you’ve got wonderful ideas. Teaching is an interruption, and so it’s the greatest pain in the neck in the world. And then there are the longer period of time when not much is coming to you. You’re not getting any ideas, and if you’re doing nothing at all, it drives you nuts! You can’t even say “I’m teaching my class.”
If you’re teaching a class, you can think about the elementary things that you know very well. These things are kind of fun and delightful. It doesn’t do any harm to think them over again. Is there a better way to present them? The elementary things are easy to think about; if you can’t think of a new thought, no harm done; what you thought about it before is good enough for the class. If you do think of something new, you’re rather pleased that you have a new way of looking at it.
The questions of the students are often the source of new research. They often ask profound questions that I’ve thought about at times and then given up on, so to speak, for a while. It wouldn’t do me any harm to think about them again and see if I can go any further now. The students may not be able to see the thing I want to answer, or the subtleties I want to think about, but they remind me of a problem by asking questions in the neighborhood of that problem. It’s not so easy to remind yourself of these things.
So I find that teaching and the students keep life going, and I would never accept any position in which somebody has invented a happy situation for me where I don’t have to teach. Never.”
— Richard Feynman, Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman!
I suspect (and this is my interpretation of what he’s said) that Alexander’s productivity would actually go down if he quit his day job. A lot of his blogging is inspired by his psychiatric work, so he would lose that source of inspiration. Also, a lot of his best works (eg. Meditations on Moloch) were written while he was a medical school resident, working 60 hours a week outside of blogging, so it’s not clear to me that the hours of working are really taking away from his best writing. They are certainly taking away from posting as frequently—he’s been posting much more frequently now on Substack—but pressure to write daily posts might take away from work on longer high quality posts.
I don’t get the impression that too much is inspired by his psychiatric work. This is partly based on my being a reader of his posts on and off over the years, and also on a brief skim of recent posts (biographies of presidents, AI safety, pregnancy interventions). But even if that source of inspiration was lost, it’d presumably be replaced by other sources of inspiration, and his writing is broad enough where at best that’d be a large net gain and at worst it’d be a small net loss.
That’s a really interesting point. Maybe I’m wrong then. Maybe I don’t understand the subtleties of what makes for good writing. But even so, writing is only one thing. I expect that with more time people like Scott would come up with other cool things to pursue in addition to writing.
This on why quitting sometimes backfires: https://applieddivinitystudies.com/2020/09/01/quitting/