Ask HN: How did you decide what problems to solve in your lifetime?

My life is an interesting train of consequences and decisions. The decisions led to some consequences, and I was able to leverage them to decide the next step.

My computing life started with Commodore64 when I was ~4, and I loved the text interface. Then I got a 486DX w/ DOS when I was 7. This led me to decide to "Learn what computers are all about and learn to program these beautiful things".

Then Windows95 happened. I didn't like the GUI first interface. This led me to find Linux. Around the same time, I found demo scene. This made me to appreciate "the raw power of computers". I decided to write programs which leverage this raw power.

At the university, I was unable to leverage my Linux knowledge, and I was getting ready to be a Windows programmer, then my second internship threw me to one of the best Linux shops in existence in my city. I've learnt low level Linux programming, and decided Linux is a requirement for me in my career. Learning Linux and loving low-level and high performance tasks formed my graduation project, which earned me the best project award. I got a call from a different department of the company that I've spent my second internship before I graduated, and I'm working there for 12 years as an HPC system administrator. As a side academic gig, I write high performance code and publish papers. What I've learnt from my job is feeding my academic gig, and my academic gig is feeding my office work. I also got Master's and Ph.D. during the process.

So, let the coincidences and events happen, then try to leverage them to my best interests. You also learn during the journey. Nothing is set in stone in the first day. I wanted to be a pure programmer in my day job, but it's much more stressful and not always enjoyable. I do what I enjoy (R&D, programming high performance stuff), and have an interesting and cutting edge job (building and managing HPC systems with latest hardware), so life is good for me. Hope everyone reading this have an even better life at the end. :)

I've been following them for a few years and, while I think there are some good ideas, I find them ultimately too unwilling to part with the status quo. I think real change in our society will require more drastic efforts that don't follow normal college-educated career trajectories.

This is something I care quite deeply about so it is the "problem I decided to solve", as OP puts it. I think what we do in professional life will most likely not involve solving meaningful problems, since most industry is not focused on such things (and can't, because it is often the cause). For me, I try to work on political and especially labour issues outside of work, since that seems to me to be the most likely way to achieve significant improvements in society.

The fact that 80000 hours has seemingly never discussed ideas involving labour unions or grassroots political activism but rather focuses on think tanks and other elitist top-down approaches is pretty telling of their neoliberal bent.

I do what interests me.

I have a lot of sympathy for your position. I have worked in many situations:

* Contractor just in it for the bucks

* Contractor in it for the freedom

* Working with a great team on interesting consulting projects

* Start-up co-founder in a space I really believed in

* Comfortable job that provided for me and mine while working on interesting projects and having autonomy.

I suggest that you pick a direction and go for it (given my extremely limited understanding of your situation, probably in the energy or ai field--better to pick something you want to do than something you feel like you should do). Better to have some movement than to idly tread water.

While every decision had consequences and closes off some options, every situation has good lessons (and that no place is perfect, at least that I have found). It's also worth realizing that not many decisions are irrevocable, if you are willing to make sacrifices.

Their career guide does specifically discuss social impact outside of your job, in terms of advocacy (what you've described), support roles, and donations.