Obviously I disagree with Tsvi regarding the value of MATS to the proto-alignment researcher; I think being exposed to high quality mentorship and peer-sourced red-teaming of your research ideas is incredibly valuable for emerging researchers. However, he makes a good point: ideally, scholars shouldn’t feel pushed to write highly competitive LTFF grant applications so soon into their research careers; there should be longer-term unconditional funding opportunities. I would love to unlock this so that a subset of scholars can explore diverse research directions for 1-2 years without 6-month grant timelines looming over them. Currently cooking something in this space.
Obviously I disagree with Tsvi regarding the value of MATS to the proto-alignment researcher; I think being exposed to high quality mentorship and peer-sourced red-teaming of your research ideas is incredibly valuable for emerging researchers. However, he makes a good point: ideally, scholars shouldn’t feel pushed to write highly competitive LTFF grant applications so soon into their research careers; there should be longer-term unconditional funding opportunities. I would love to unlock this so that a subset of scholars can explore diverse research directions for 1-2 years without 6-month grant timelines looming over them. Currently cooking something in this space.