80000hours.org
Vitalik Buterin on better ways to fund public goods, the blockchain’s failures so far, & how it could yet change the world
As well as effective altruism, the blockchain's problems so far, and how it could yet change the world.
Is it possible to leave a helpful message for a future civilization, just in case humanity dies out?
If humanity dies out, many millions of years later intelligent life might evolve again. Is there any message we could leave that would reliably help them out?
Is US gun control an important issue?
After the shocking massacre in Connecticut it looks like gun control is going to draw a lot of attention from Obama and Congress this year. This got me thinking about how important gun control might be as a political cause. The potential good...
How many lives does a doctor save? - Part 2 - Diminishing marginal returns
In the first post, I worked out an upper bound for the average direct health impact of a doctor in the UK, and found it amounted to producing about 2600 QALYs. We can think of this, very roughly, as saving 90 lives. This doesn’t, however, show how...
The new 30-person research team in DC investigating how emerging technologies could affect national security
How might international security be altered if the impact of machine learning is similar to that of electricity?
Philosophy is one of the hardest grad programs. Is it worth it, if you want to use ideas to change the world?
Some of the most important questions that arise for people trying to make the world a better place are philosophical. What does it mean to live a worthwhile life? What are our obligations to future generations? And how do we decide what to do when...
Accurately predicting the future is central to everything. Here's how you can do it better.
Prof Tetlock has spent 40 years studying accurate forecasting, collecting 1,000,000s of predictions from 10,000s of participants.
80,000 Hours 2018 Annual Review
We review our progress and mistakes over 2018, and plans for 2019.
How to do high impact research
An introduction to how to have an impact in research: which graduate programs are best, what should you prioritise early career, and which topics are best?
Recap: why do some organisations say their recent hires are worth so much?
Our 2018 survey found that for a second year, a significant fraction of organisations reported that they’d want to be compensated hundreds of thousands or sometimes millions of dollars for the loss of a recent hire for three years. There was some...
We don't say how we really feel, and how this makes social change frequent, abrupt & unpredictable
Top legal scholar Prof Cass Sunstein explains and defends his new book, How Change Happens.
Prof Tetlock on predicting catastrophe, keeping your politics secret & when experts know more than you
You and your friends think something is 70% likely - this forecasting expert explains why it’s more than 70% likely.
DeepMind's plans to make AI systems robust & reliable, why it's a core issue in AI design, and how to succeed at AI research
Research to keep AI reliable is no more a side-project in AI design than keeping a bridge standing is a side-project in bridge design.
Effective altruists love systemic change
Yesterday we put to rest the idea that 80,000 Hours, and effective altruists more generally, are only enthusiastic about ‘earning to give’. While some people should earn to give, we expect the right share is under 20%, and think that ‘earning to...