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Capla comments on Open thread, Dec. 15 - Dec. 21, 2014 - Less Wrong
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Do we have any evidence about the severity of that information lag? I can't imagine it would be much more than a year. I don't know if this is a legitimatize concern. It may very well be worth a little waste value from info-lag for the benefit of overall efficiency.
Are we talking about lag within the community of people who read Givewell regularly, or in the broader community? Because that might be right for the former, but the latter has a lag that I expect to be measured in at least decades. Possibly centuries, given how much money still goes to churches.
I don't think people who are giving their charity to churches are trying to give to the most efficient charity.
This is sort of the point. The more one is concerned with efficiency (like those who are concerned about the marginal benefit of a great charity vs. the best charity), the less an info-lag will have an effect on him/her. Effective Altruists who are thinking at the level of "I should only give to one absolutely best charity, to maximize marginal value", are not likely to pick a charity and give to it blindly, never again looking at the least bit of evidence of marginal effectiveness.
I'm willing to wager that the marginal value lost due to an info lag when everyone is giving to only the best charity and aren't paying enough attention, is vastly outweighed by the value produced due to everyone giving to the absolute best charities.
Sure, everyone should at a minimum aim to be very near the top, and the crowd who'd ever benefit from this discussion is the same crowd that's least likely to suffer from lag. I'm attempting to make a theoretical case, not saying "Don't donate to the best charities!".