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Database of the Most Impactful Research Questions by Discipline and Cause Area

$500raised
$50,000funding goal
$500valuation
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Update: we are making progress on our research questions databases at https://effectivethesis.org/questions/

Longer description of your proposed project

Effective Thesis presents an innovative project to develop a public database of the highest-impact research questions for each cause area and academic discipline. This digital platform will serve as a nexus for students, researchers, professors, and non-profits dedicated to identifying and working on pivotal research questions that address the most pressing global challenges. By facilitating access to a curated list of research questions with the potential to influence various fields significantly, we aim to accelerate scientific and humanitarian progress.

Goals and Achievement Strategy: Our goal is to construct and maintain a dynamic, user-friendly database that:

  • Aggregates high-impact research questions from diverse disciplines.

  • Provides an interactive forum for collaboration and idea exchange.

  • Encourages the academic and non-profit sectors to prioritize and engage with research that has the potential for profound societal benefit.

We will achieve these goals by:

  1. Collaborating with leading academics, research organizations and experts to collect and vet top research questions by cause area, discipline, and degree level.

  2. Developing an intuitive platform that allows for easy navigation and collaboration.

  3. Implementing a rigorous, peer-review process to ensure the quality and impact potential of listed questions and monitoring and evaluating the impact of this new database.

Funding Utilization: The funding will be allocated towards:

  1. Collaborate extensively with a wider network of academics and cause area experts to identify the highest-leverage research questions across disciplines.

  2. Develop a robust, user-friendly platform to host the curated question repository and facilitate collaboration among researchers.

  3. Conduct targeted outreach to universities, think tanks, non-profits, and student groups to drive engagement with the platform and the high-impact research opportunities it highlights.

  4. Implement a rigorous question evaluation methodology and maintain the database with the most up-to-date, relevant content.

Team and Track Record: The Effective Thesis team comprises experienced professionals in research, teaching, program development, and community engagement. We have a proven track record of student-focused initiatives that enhance the student academic community's capacity to address significant challenges and to increase the community of young people that work on addressing such challenges both during and after their studies.

Premortem - Potential Failure Causes and Outcomes: The most likely causes of failure could be insufficient user engagement or challenges in maintaining a high-quality question repository. These could result in the platform not achieving its full potential impact. Mitigation strategies include ongoing community outreach, user feedback integration, and continuous content review.

Additional Funding: We are exploring additional funding avenues, including academic grants and partnerships with philanthropic organizations committed to research and development.

Other ways I can learn about you

https://effectivethesis.org/

https://effectivethesis.org/meet-our-team/

Estimate your probability of succeeding if you get the amount of money you asked for

Considering our experience, network, and the urgent need for such a well-maintained database of high-potential research questions, we estimate a 95% probability of achieving significant milestones within the first year. Success would include establishing the questions database framework, collecting top questions by cause area, and forming partnerships with key research organizations to collect and vet questions and reach out to new students and researchers.

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EffectiveThesis avatar

Update: Effective Thesis Milestones

Effective Thesis has made substantial progress over the past year. We now feature four research question databases on our newly transitioned website, showcasing impactful research topics across diverse disciplines and cause areas. This resource empowers students and researchers to pursue high-impact projects aligned with pressing global challenges. Additionally, leadership transitioned smoothly from Joel Christoph to Hana McMahon-Cole, ensuring continuity in operations and focus on our mission. Visit https://effectivethesis.org/questions/ to explore the updated databases.

🥨

Dony Christie

12 months ago

Effective Thesis has existed for at least five and a half years, though I haven't followed it too closely. I'm confused what about this is different from its previous offerings. I don't know how much influence it has either (e.g. how many people visit the website, have plan changes, produce theses based on your suggestions, or however you measure it).

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EffectiveThesis avatar

@Wormhole Hi Dony, thanks for your question about how Effective Thesis has evolved. While we have provided coaching, newsletters, research area guides, and other services since our founding 5.5 years ago, our team and offerings have adapted to serve students and future researchers more cost-effectively.

Until mid-2023, we operated with a 5.5 FTE team. However, due to funding constraints, we had to scale down and now function with 1.75 FTE under my direction as the new director. This transition led us to focus on more direct service offerings, such as helping students select well-defined research questions and interact in our Slack community while maintaining existing resources like our website research area guides.

Our impact is demonstrated through our reach and student success stories. We have around 70,000 to 90,000 unique website visitors annually and have provided one-to-one coaching to over 2,000 students. Many of these students have credited Effective Thesis as instrumental in their choice of thesis topic, supervisor, funding, or postgraduate program. We have numerous examples of theses submitted by students who have used our services, representing just a small fraction of those we've helped.

We are operating at a minimal burn rate with runway until late 2024 and are dedicated to continuing our mission of supporting students and researchers in pursuing high-impact work. Please let me know if you have any other questions!

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EffectiveThesis avatar

Update: we are making progress on our research questions databases at https://effectivethesis.org/questions/

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Jason avatar

Jason

about 1 year ago

What is the most likely thing you would do with a little bit of extra funding? The "funding utilization" section feels rather generic, making it hard for me to assess the counterfactual impact of additional funding on top of whatever current funding you have.

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EffectiveThesis avatar

Dear Jason,

Thank you for your thoughtful inquiry about the potential impact of additional funding for our project. Your observation that the "funding utilization" section could benefit from more specificity is greatly appreciated. Let me explain further how extra funding would significantly bolster our efforts.

Effective Thesis operates on an extremely lean budget, dedicating every available resource to maintaining our core operations. This strict funding constraint severely limits our ability to pursue the development of the research questions database. This project would greatly amplify our impact by providing a crucial resource to the student, academic, and altruistic communities.

The funds we seek to raise through this campaign would be allocated directly to developing and maintaining this database for public use. Without this additional targeted funding, we lack the resources and capacity to bring this high-potential tool to fruition and to maintain it continuously as required.

To be more precise, supplementary funding would empower our team to:

  1. Collaborate extensively with a wider network of academics and cause area experts to identify the highest-leverage research questions across disciplines.

  2. Develop a robust, user-friendly platform to host the curated question repository and facilitate research collaboration.

  3. Conduct targeted outreach to universities, think tanks, non-profits, and student groups to drive engagement with the platform and the high-impact research opportunities it highlights.

  4. Implement a rigorous question evaluation methodology and maintain the database with the most up-to-date, relevant content.

In essence, incremental funding would make the critical difference between this high-potential resource existing in a well-developed, publicly accessible form or not coming into being. It would unlock our ability to deliver a powerful tool for advancing pivotal research into the hands of the academic and altruistic communities, accelerating progress on the most pressing global challenges.

I hope this added context illustrates the counterfactual value that your support would provide. We are committed to maximizing the impact of every dollar entrusted to us. Funding from partners like you makes work like this possible.

Please let me know if you have any other questions. I would be more than happy to discuss this further.

🐷

Aaron Lehmann

about 1 year ago

I think this is a compelling concept, but ultimately assessing impact of a research area is at least somewhat subjective, if not speculative. I found that the causes promoted by Effective Thesis didn't line up well with my own priorities, so I decided against funding this project. However, I wish them the best and support their overall mission.

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EffectiveThesis avatar

@aaronl Hi Aaron, thank you for your thoughtful comment and for supporting our mission. It's important for us to align our work with the priorities of those who share our vision for impactful research. Could you share more about your priorities in terms of causes? Understanding diverse perspectives helps us refine our approach and ensure we're inclusive of a broad range of impactful research areas.

🐷

Aaron Lehmann

about 1 year ago

The cause areas have a big emphasis on animal welfare, which isn't something that ranks very high up in my personal moral calculus. My top priorities mostly fall under the "global health and wellbeing" category, which admittedly is represented on the site, but only at the same level of prominence as e.g. "insect welfare in farmed, wild, and research context".

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EffectiveThesis avatar

@aaronl Hi Aaron, thank you for sharing your concerns and priorities. We appreciate your focus on global health and wellbeing, which indeed is a crucial area. I wanted to inform you that since August 2023, Effective Thesis has undergone significant changes in our team and focus areas. Specifically, projects related to animal welfare are now primarily managed by a separate organization, Vegan Thesis, which we helped co-found. You can explore their work at veganthesis.org.

This shift allows Effective Thesis to broaden our emphasis on a diverse range of cause areas, including a stronger focus on global health and wellbeing, among others. The previous emphasis on animal welfare on our platform was a reflection of our past scope, which, thanks to our division of labor with Vegan Thesis, now enables us to better align with a wider array of impactful research areas, including those you've highlighted as your top priorities.

We're committed to facilitating research that tackles the world's most pressing challenges across all cause areas, with the aim to include and prioritize high-impact opportunities in global health and wellbeing. Your feedback is helpful to us in reviewing our approach and ensuring our resources are directed towards facilitating impactful research that resonates with the diverse priorities of our community.

🐝

Dmitrii

about 1 year ago

I have the same idea for a project, but using LLMs and parsing papers instead of the manual analysis. Your linked website doesn't open, how can I find out more?

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EffectiveThesis avatar

Our Effective Thesis website is back up! I'm happy to chat for more info. Email me at joel@effectivethesis.org
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