How do you make new year's predictions? 1. Assemble a list of predictions about what you think will happen in the next year. 2. Assign probabilities to each item. I follow the approach of picking a limited number of probabilities (51%, 60%, 70%, 80%, and 90%) and assigning one to...
I recommend "Pricing niche products: Why sell a mechanical keyboard kit for $1,668?" for providing a practical case study in price dynamics that helped with my economic intuitions. The author's friend had created a new custom keyboard kit. Their friend's previous kit had sold out in minutes, so clearly something...
Anecdata on:
Our understanding of the melatonin cycle strongly suggests melatonin taken first thing upon waking up would work for this, but as far as I know this has never been formally investigated. The best I can find is researchers saying that they think it would happen and being confused why no other researcher has investigated this.
I once accidentally took 0.3mg melatonin around 9:00am in the morning, and the subsequent few days felt almost exactly like my experience of recovering from quite bad jetlag after returning from a timezone 5-6 hours earlier than mine.
Thank you for your idea and for sharing these links. I just listened to the Anthropocene Reviewed on the Seed Potatoes of Leningrad (linked in another comment, starts at 11:40) and How Nikolay Vavilov, the seed collector who tried to end famine, died of starvation while eating a late dinner before the fast begins. It was a little painful to feast on pita sandwiches and french fries while hearing about people dying of starvation, but it felt a little appropriate, too; in my life, famine is more or less ended, and that wouldn't have been a guarantee for my ancestors a century ago.
Another way to separate these two concepts is whether you're trying to hold yourself to an internal or external standard. This is captured by this Lois McMaster Bujold quote (though she uses "reputation" where you might use "PR"):
Reputation is what other people know about you. Honor is what you know about yourself. Guard your honor. Let your reputation fall where it will.
To me, internal vs. external seems like the more crucial distinction than "fixed standard" (reputation) vs. "modelled reactions" (PR) that you describe in the post.
How do you make new year's predictions?
The first item on that list is where I usually get stuck, so here's a template predictions list for you (you'll be prompted... (read 966 more words →)
It's not confusing that Nigeria, in particular, has few cases. They have a really well-developed containment (disinfection + contact tracing + case isolation) infrastructure.
During the 2014 West African Ebola epidemic, an Ebola-positive patient showed up in Lagos, one of the most dense cities on the planet, and yet the country only ended up with 20 cases total.
My understanding (can't seem to find a great citation for this, learned it from a CDC person at a conference) is that Nigeria's internationally-funded efforts to eradicate polio (no wild polio since 2016!) helped to build world-leading containment expertise. The fact that Nigeria was able to contain Ebola was cited as an example of why international
I recommend "Pricing niche products: Why sell a mechanical keyboard kit for $1,668?" for providing a practical case study in price dynamics that helped with my economic intuitions.
The author's friend had created a new custom keyboard kit. Their friend's previous kit had sold out in minutes, so clearly something was amiss with their "estimate costs and premiums and then set a price" approach:
I’m not a fan of this inside-out approach, for several reasons:
- factors like “brand premium” are inherently subjective — the temptation to compare to others limits potential upside and differentiation
- picking a (new, higher) price may have reputational downsides (because o_f course_ your customers spend all day in mechanical keyboard chat rooms
Applications for Catalyst, a collaborative biosecurity summit, are now open.
On February 22, 2020, at The Laundry in San Francisco, a diverse group of synthetic biologists, policymakers, academics, and biohackers will come together to discuss one of the biggest emerging questions of the 21st century—how do we engineer a future enhanced by biotechnology and not endangered by it?
If you’d like to meet other individuals invested in the future of biotechnology, participate in forward-thinking conversations, or brainstorm solutions to open problems in biosecurity, apply by December 7th to secure a spot.
Acorn Cryotech, a Toronto startup, does this. They store cells from hair follicles, but I think they're still in the process of launching, so you can only get your cells collected at their office or at certain events attended by their staff. It's $300 CAD upfront and $16/month (i.e. $192/year) thereafter.
Is this a good idea?
I don't know a ton about longevity research (i.e. I've read the Longevity FAQ, the LRI blog, and a few papers here and there), so I wouldn't give my opinion here too much weight. Reviewing the FAQ linked above, it seems reasonable to believe that:
My experience of taking melatonin a few hours before bed is very similar to what Gwern described as the self-discipline benefit:
... (read more)Speaking from personal experience, I know that one of the obstacles to sleeping well is going to sleep at all. Even though one knows that one ought to go to bed on time, and that not doing so will cause problems, it’s hard to actually do it. One wants to finish the book, chat with friends, play a game, etc. It is even more difficult when one doesn’t feel tired. For me, I had a chronic akrasia problem with going to sleep; in college, it was bad enough that I would on
I'm appreciative of you bringing up counterfactuals and do think they're important to consider.
As someone who regularly hosts events at REACH, my counterfactual locations would be a room on UC Berkeley campus or in a public library. These have some disadvantages compared to REACH:
I'm curious about the reasoning behind that statement, too.
This suggestion would unnecessarily concentrate donations among people with existing social connections to one another, no? I don't expect that I personally know the world's highest-leverage people. Even if I know some of them, I expect that organizations that dedicate resources to finding high-leverage people or opportunities (GiveWell, EA Funds, etc.) will fund opportunities with a better expected value than those that happen to be in front of me.
Is the reasoning here that those organizations are likely to miss the opportunities that happen to be in front of me personally? Or that sharing resources in local social communities strengthens them in a way that has particularly large benefits? Or that you've more carefully selected the people you have social connections to, such that they are likely to be overlooked-yet-high-leverage?
(I think I'm coming from a slightly more sceptical starting point than gwillen, but also feel like I could be missing something important here.)
I think sufficiently imprecise praise can even be net-negative for someone's worth, because their internal monologue might still be doubting or denying your praise. I wrote a post a few years ago on how to provide Specific Positivity:
With specific positivity, you try to give someone evidence that they should be praised, rather than praise itself. They don’t bristle or argue, because all you’ve given them is a description of your own experience. The recipient of your compliment can then use your descriptive evidence to compliment themselves. This is the goal, anyway- get them to feel good by recognizing the good they’ve done or been.
Compliments aren't necessarily easy, but I agree that they're worthwhile.
Two short talks on GBCR-related topics:
Gene editing therapies in humans: current state of the art, history of techniques - Samira Nedungadi
The US Federal Select Agent Program: what it is, its history, and criticisms of it - Brian Wang
This takes place at the EA community center. No need to call anyone to get in, just come to the front door and knock. This event is open to both people familiar with and new to thinking about biosecurity. It is baby-in-arms friendly, but not child-friendly
The goal of EA Global is to increase attendees’ knowledge, skills and networks to enable them to do the most good possible.
Content will be aimed at existing EA community members who already have a solid understanding of effective altruism, but would like to gain skills, network, master more complex problems, or move into new roles.
Programming will include:
Who is EA Global a good fit for?
We think the following kinds of attendees are particularly likely to find the conference valuable:
Two short talks!
How do we develop vaccines? Why is it hard? - Megan Crawford
Asilomar and other codes of Responsible Biological Conduct - Tessa Alexanian
This takes place at the EA community center. No need to call anyone to get in, just come to the front door and knock. This event is open to both people familiar with and new to thinking about biosecurity. It is baby-in-arms friendly, but not child-friendly.
This is nice to see, I’ve been generally kind of unimpressed by what have felt like overly generous handwaves re: gray gooey nanobots, and I do think biological cells are probably our best comparison point for how nanobots might work in practice.
That said, I see some of the discussion here veering in the direction of brainstorming novel ways to do harm with biology, which we have a general norm against in the biosecurity community – just wanted to offer a nudge to y’all to consider the cost vs. benefit of sharing takes in that direction. Feel free to follow up with me over DM!