Hi, I am relatively new to LessWrong and Rationalism but I’ve been trying to learn more about it over the last year or so. I am a Computer Science student from the UK and am about to graduate from university. I have been trying to figure out my career path from here and in the process have been applying to jobs and post-grad courses in a pretty scattershot way. I think though that I should maybe consider taking a more methodical approach.
My philosophy in life is broadly that there is little point to it, but that I can justify my own existence if I can do some measure of good. If I can make a difference to enough people or to the world and leave it a better place than I found it then at least I wasn’t entirely pointless or a complete waste of space, oxygen and other natural resources. So far, I have spent my life learning and becoming a functioning adult, but now it’s time to start really earning my place here.
So the question is, how can I do the most amount of good using the time and skills that I have? Clearly just working in some random corporate job, or for a defence company could earn me a very good living, but won’t do much good.
Luckily, I am a problem solver, and there are many, many problems to solve. The challenge, then, is which to solve and how?
My first question is how do I find the problem that I should be working on? I guess I’m asking how can I quantify the most important issues we face as a species and as a society and how can I figure out which which ones I can have the greatest impact on?
There are 3 options: Get a job, start a business/non-profit or do research. There are many ways of mixing and matching these but these are the 3 main career options. I think that which one I choose depends greatly on what issue I’m tackling but any ideas on how I should think about that rationally would also help.
Thank you in advance for any answers.
I’m in a very similar situation, graduating next spring with a math degree in the US. I’ll sketch out my personal situation (to help contextualize my advice) followed my approach for career scouting. If you haven’t checked out 80k hours, I really suggest doing so, because they have much more thorough and likely wiser advice than I do.
I’m a 19-year-old undergrad in a rural part of the US. My dad’s a linguistics professor and pushing me to do a PhD. I want to do AI safety research, and am currently weighing the usefulness of a PhD compared to saving money to do self-funded work. I’m also sort-of Buddhist / nihilist / absurdist, which points me towards utilitarianism.
I strongly encourage anything to do with AI safety. Specific examples here include working to donate money to Open Phil’s longtermism fund, policy research, nonprofit alignment research, being a DeepMind Scalable Alignment researcher, and software development for Lightcone Infrastructure. I’d be very careful here though; are you looking for local or global goods? E.g. I’ve a friend working to improve ethical data collection, which I think is important in a platonic sense, but not comparable to x-risk work.
Onto processes. Writing out all of my thoughts helps me to be rigorous and honest with myself. It increases my functional working memory because my thoughts are saved on screen, freeing up cognitive capacity for introspection.
Say for example that I’m weighing how I’d research in the EU vs US. I write down how I feel initially, including possible biases (EU probably has better living conditions; US has more researchers; I should be careful not to anchor on these feelings). As I go through, I find knowledge gaps (where will I have more free time, and by how much?) and brainstorm how to fill them (my dad knows German researchers. They’d be good to ask about this). I find extelligence helps me move much faster and build a game plan.
Another thing is to discuss your plans with others. I know LessWrong is an example, but in-person discussion is probably better.
I strongly caution you to watch out for obligation / guilt. Even if you don’t feel it yet, the mindset “I owe this to the world” can push you to some dark and counterproductive places. As said here, make sure you’ve put your own oxygen mask on before helping others.
Feel free to message me. Best of luck.
I have looked at 80k hours, although I haven’t read through much of their career advice (The last year has been hectic). I will try to read more into that after finishing my last assignment when I find the time.
The idea of doing a Master’s or PhD is attractive, I have applied to a fair number, but like I said I’m unsure of the usefulness/impact of research and further learning in that way compared to finding a job or cause to work on. So far my ideal situation would be some sort of job or personal endeavor that would allow me to do post-grad part-time.
AI alignment is definitely one of many interests, although I feel that it’s a big focus at the moment and might be oversaturated (I’m not sure but worth thinking about). Lightcone looks interesting although I’m not sure about relocating to the States.
I like the idea of writing down how I feel about something for extra thinking space, I have been doing similar things for a while but I’ll try doing more of that. I think the big thing I’m looking for is if there’s any way of quantifying the problem, I suspect that this isn’t the perfect way of approaching this mostly unquantifiable problem but my nature requires me to look for it regardless.
I understand that this feels very self-destructive/unhealthy but I think that this belief is a natural consequence of my base beliefs about reality. Strangely enough, I don’t project it onto others as that would be unfair to them, but still see it as an obligation for myself. In any case, it also extends to self-care; if I don’t look after myself first then I will be unable to work or learn and therefore useless anyway.