Should we train guide dogs for the blind?
The obvious answer is yes. I don’t feel as strongly. The entire process of training dogs can cost over $40000. Instead of training one guide dog, we could treat thousands with Anti Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Therapy. With this I am strongly against training Guide Dogs.
Broader point
Whereas the specific case above might not hold, the broader point feels important:
Many movements and decisions happen at a societal level due to the awareness and emotion that they create, rather than the actual benefit that they provide to humanity.
In order to align society wide benefits with popular sentiment, I am keen on building a tool that allows for direct comparison of actions against their societal benefit AND the cost of implementing them, in practice reaping the benefits of a benefit cost analysis in a simple interface. This would follow a Pricing framework briefly touched by Joshua Green on Moral Tribes. I started laying out the ideas for the framework on Prioritising Societal Change.