“Our Levels of Ambition Should Match The Problems We’re Solving” by Matt Beard
EA Forum Podcast (Curated & popular)19 Feb

“Our Levels of Ambition Should Match The Problems We’re Solving” by Matt Beard

[I am a career advisor at 80,000 Hours. I've been thinking about something Will MacAskill said recently in an interview with my shrimp-friend Matt: "should people be more ambitious? I genuinely think yes. I think people systematically aren't ambitious enough, so the answer is almost always yes. Again, the ambition you have should match the scale of the problems that we're facing—and the scale of those problems is very large indeed."

This post is my reflection on these ideas.]

************

My last post argued that if you want to have a great career, your goal should not be to get a job. Instead, you should choose an important problem to work on, then “get good and be known.” Building skills will allow you to solve problems and reap the benefits.

In the ~500 career advising calls I’ve hosted in the past year, the most common response I’ve heard has been: “Okay, how good? How well known? How many hours of practice will get me there?” Most people want to calibrate their ambitions so that the time and energy they invest feels worth it to them.

I empathize with this, but when I’m honest– with myself for my own [...]

---

Outline:

(06:28) Jensen Huang is more ambitious than you

(12:58) Most extreme ambition is misplaced

(17:45) Okay, how can altruistic people aim higher and work harder?

(21:17) Ambition at the End of the Human Era

(24:03) Closing Caveats - Efficiency, Burnout, and Choosing What Matters

---

First published:
February 12th, 2026

Source:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/7qsisgX3cwETJuPNz/our-levels-of-ambition-should-match-the-problems-we-re

---

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

---

Images from the article:

Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Avsnitt(250)

[Linkpost] “Starfish” by Aaron Gertler 🔸

[Linkpost] “Starfish” by Aaron Gertler 🔸

This is a link post. By Alexander Wales Thousands of starfish had washed up on the beach, and a little girl was diligently throwing them back into the water, one at a time. A man came up to the girl a...

1 Maj 4min

“Time Sensitive Urgent Animal Welfare Action” by Bentham’s Bulldog

“Time Sensitive Urgent Animal Welfare Action” by Bentham’s Bulldog

The EATS act—now called the save our bacon act—would make it illegal for states to pass animal welfare laws that apply to products produced out of state. This would gut most state level animal protect...

29 Apr 1min

“Forecasting is Way Overrated, and We Should Stop Funding It” by Marcus Abramovitch 🔸

“Forecasting is Way Overrated, and We Should Stop Funding It” by Marcus Abramovitch 🔸

Summary EA and rationalists got enamoured with forecasting and prediction markets and made them part of the culture, but this hasn’t proven very useful, yet it continues to receive substantial EA fun...

26 Apr 8min

“My lover, effective altruism” by Natalie_Cargill

“My lover, effective altruism” by Natalie_Cargill

Crossposted from Substack. This post is part of a 30-posts-in-30-days ordeal at Inkhaven. All suboptimalities are the result of that. This is part 2, here is part 1 in my EA mini series! On my way to ...

26 Apr 8min

“A Database of Near-Term Interventions for Wild Animals” by Bob Fischer

“A Database of Near-Term Interventions for Wild Animals” by Bob Fischer

The Animal Welfare Department (AWD) at Rethink Priorities supports high-impact strategies to help animals, especially where suffering is vast and largely neglected. Therefore, one of our focus areas i...

24 Apr 17min

“The AI people have been right a lot” by Dylan Matthews

“The AI people have been right a lot” by Dylan Matthews

This post was crossposted from Dylan Matthew's blog by the EA Forum team. The author may not see or reply to comments. Subtitle: Try to keep an open mind as the world gets increasingly wild.The crowd ...

20 Apr 10min

[Linkpost] “The Anthropic IPO Is Coming. We Aren’t Ready for It.” by Sophie Kim

[Linkpost] “The Anthropic IPO Is Coming. We Aren’t Ready for It.” by Sophie Kim

This is a link post. More money is coming than AI safety has ever seen. The capacity to deploy it doesn't exist yet.Image Source: Fortune.com This week, Anthropic announced Claude Mythos Preview– a mo...

17 Apr 15min

“AI Safety’s Biggest Talent Gap Isn’t Researchers. It’s Generalists.” by Topaz, Agustín Covarrubias 🔸, Alexandra Bates, Parv Mahajan, Kairos

“AI Safety’s Biggest Talent Gap Isn’t Researchers. It’s Generalists.” by Topaz, Agustín Covarrubias 🔸, Alexandra Bates, Parv Mahajan, Kairos

This post was cross posted to LessWrong TL;DR: One of the largest talent gaps in AI safety is competent generalists: program managers, fieldbuilders, operators, org leaders, chiefs of staff, founders....

16 Apr 13min

Populärt inom Samhälle & Kultur

podme-dokumentar
gynning-berg
aftonbladet-krim
en-mork-historia
p3-dokumentar
creepypodden-med-jack-werner
skaringer-nessvold
svenska-fall
spar
aftonbladet-daily
killradet
hor-har
kod-katastrof
mardromsgasten
rss-brottsutredarna
flashback-forever
vad-blir-det-for-mord
rysarpodden
rss-mer-an-bara-morsa
larm-vi-minns