but it seems to me like a simple assessment using the ABC model I outlined in the post should take only a few minutes
Empirically, many people new to the field get very paralysed and anxious about fears of doing accidental harm, in a way that I believe has significant costs. I haven’t fully followed the specific model you outline, but it seems to involve ridiculously hard questions around the downstream consequences of your work, which I struggle to robustly apply to my work (indirect effects are really hard man!). Ditto, telling someone that they need to ask someone more experienced to sanity check can have significant costs in terms of social anxiety (I personally sure would publish fewer blog posts if I felt a need to run each one by someone like Chris Olah first!)
Having significant costs doesn’t mean that doing this is bad, per se, but there needs to be major benefits to match these costs, and I’m just incredibly unconvinced that people’s first research projects meet these. Maybe if you’ve gotten a bunch of feedback from more experienced people that your work is awesome? But also, if you’re in that situation, then you can probably ask them whether they’re concerned.
Empirically, many people new to the field get very paralysed and anxious about fears of doing accidental harm, in a way that I believe has significant costs. I haven’t fully followed the specific model you outline, but it seems to involve ridiculously hard questions around the downstream consequences of your work, which I struggle to robustly apply to my work (indirect effects are really hard man!). Ditto, telling someone that they need to ask someone more experienced to sanity check can have significant costs in terms of social anxiety (I personally sure would publish fewer blog posts if I felt a need to run each one by someone like Chris Olah first!)
Having significant costs doesn’t mean that doing this is bad, per se, but there needs to be major benefits to match these costs, and I’m just incredibly unconvinced that people’s first research projects meet these. Maybe if you’ve gotten a bunch of feedback from more experienced people that your work is awesome? But also, if you’re in that situation, then you can probably ask them whether they’re concerned.