We, the Center on Long-Term Risk (CLR), will run our first Intro Seminar to Risks of Astronomical Suffering (s-risks). The seminar is intended to help interested effective altruists get up to speed with how we think about s-risks.

It will take place on the weekend of February 20 & 21, 2021.

The program will feature talks by CLR staff, discussion groups, and 1:1 calls. We will cover what we currently consider to be the most important s-risks (TAI conflict & cooperation, risks from malevolent actors). We also plan to give concrete guidance on how to contribute to reducing s-risks with your career. We will finalize the program based on the needs of the participants.

Target audience

We think this event will be useful for you if:

• You are interested in s-risks and are at least seriously considering to make this cause a priority for your career; and
• You have not interacted extensively with CLR (staff) yet, e.g., you have talked with us for less than 10h.

There might be more idiosyncratic reasons to apply, and we intend the bullet points above to be a guide rather than strict criteria.

Application details

You can apply to participate in this seminar by filling out this short Google Form. The deadline is January 4, 2021, at 11:59 pm Pacific Time. In some cases, we might ask applicants for a brief interview (10-15 minutes). We expect to make final application decisions by January 15, 2021.

If you have any questions about the event or are uncertain whether to apply, you can comment on this post, reach out to stefan.torges@longtermrisk.org, or message me on this forum.

Logistics

The event will take place remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We will use Zoom to facilitate the seminar. 

We will send out preparatory reading ahead of the seminar to ensure shared knowledge among the participants. We expect it to be around 60 pages.