Well, the marginal impact of a life-not-saved on the probability of a p-sing (can I call it that? What I really want is a convenient short-hand for “tiny incremental increase in the probability of a positive singularity.”) probably goes down as more we put more effort into achieving a p-sing, but not significantly for the problem. The law of diminishing marginal returns gets you every time.
Let’s not get to caught up in the numbers (which I do think are useful for considering a real trade-off). I don’t know how likely a p-sing is, nor how much my efforts can contribute to one. I am interested in analysis of this question, but I don’t think we can have high confidence in an prediction that goes out 20 years or more, especially if the situation requires the introduction of such world-shaping technologies as would lead up to a singularity. If everyone acts as I do, but we’re massively wrong about how much impact our efforts have (which is likely), then we all waste enormous effort on nothing.
Given that you are only one individual, the increase in the chance of a p-sing for each unit of money you give is roughly linear, so diminishing marginal returns shouldn’t be an issue.
Well, the marginal impact of a life-not-saved on the probability of a p-sing (can I call it that? What I really want is a convenient short-hand for “tiny incremental increase in the probability of a positive singularity.”) probably goes down as more we put more effort into achieving a p-sing, but not significantly for the problem. The law of diminishing marginal returns gets you every time.
Let’s not get to caught up in the numbers (which I do think are useful for considering a real trade-off). I don’t know how likely a p-sing is, nor how much my efforts can contribute to one. I am interested in analysis of this question, but I don’t think we can have high confidence in an prediction that goes out 20 years or more, especially if the situation requires the introduction of such world-shaping technologies as would lead up to a singularity. If everyone acts as I do, but we’re massively wrong about how much impact our efforts have (which is likely), then we all waste enormous effort on nothing.
Given that you are only one individual, the increase in the chance of a p-sing for each unit of money you give is roughly linear, so diminishing marginal returns shouldn’t be an issue.