Bricks and exponentials: a note on how I evaluate projects

Eli Tyre is sharing a framework for strategic analysis and project evaluation in a new essay. As LessWrong tells it, Tyre argues that labor is best spent on projects that are 'upstream of an exponential,' meaning they trigger a self-reinforcing process rather than just providing a linear contribution. He uses the analogy of building a wall to suggest that producing a few thousand bricks is irrelevant unless those bricks are used to build more kilns or schools that can scale production by orders of magnitude.

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