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The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

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Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#91

Post by wizofaus »

joindpp wrote: post #79
wizofaus wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about "always", but yes, there's a strong rational element behind favouring friends and especially family, and in general others that you're more likely to interact with in the future. For one thing, I'd think confidence that you have family members that will ensure your children will thrive even after you're gone gives peace of mind for most parents. And even if I never actually need help from family or…

In defense of marketing and admin budgets. What would you prefer, a nonprofit where $100 of your donation goes to "providing help" (I don't really know what that means, since money alone can't do anything) or a nonprofit where $30 of your $100 is invested in "marketing and admin" which results in: - the charity has $500 - there are admin humans around to "provide help" (and you're paying them a decent or even above-a…

I wouldn't consider 30% unreasonable or an example of money being swallowed - but there are known instances of non-profits where over 60% of donations go towards covering such costs (the Law Enforcement Legal Defense fund supposedly is one of the worst offenders).

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#92

Post by Fellshard »

Forgive me if this is reductive, but could this mentality not be summarized as: 'Justifying the means by the ends, accumulate as much wealth as possible at any cost to some groups in order to distribute it to the other groups towards which /I/ feel altruistic.'

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#93

Post by hardwaregeek »

ketzo wrote: post #26
hardwaregeek wrote: post #15

Maybe this is superficial, but I was put off by the name "effective altruism". By naming it such, it felt like an implicit dig that most altruism is not effective. Like oh your altruism is not that productive, but my altruism, well it's effective altruism. Especially when that notion is pushed by people who overlap with the rationalist subculture, another arrogantly named group. In general I find it concerning when t…

I mean, I think it was a very explicit dig. The founding idea is that giving $10,000 to save, y’know, four ailing dogs with bad livers or whatever, or a community theater, as opposed to many human lives, is fundamentally wrong. “If you’re gonna give, you should maximize the impact as measured in human life” is fundamentally at odds with many common forms of giving, yes.

The example of a community theater highlights another issue I have with effective altruism. It effectively encourages you to only donate to things you can make a quantifiable case for. And in a lot of situations, quantification fails. The arts have an immense value in developing philosophical, emotional, empathetic values. A theater may not show up in a balance sheet but it can have a massive effect. And it does concern me deeply that the flippant example for "non-effective altruism" is community theater. It reflects the attitude of SBF that a book is not worth reading. That is a profoundly destructive mindset.

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#94

Post by chatterhead »

thundergolfer wrote: post #86
chatterhead wrote: post #65

Effective Altruism is bullshit and here is why; because, the invisible hand has already shown itself to be a far better lever of human good through the acceptance of human nature. "Helping people" implies you know what people need. It's a power position to begin with and thus designed to fulfill the doers goals of doing good not the receivers 'need' of being helped. Each of us, individually, pursuing our own self-int…

How’d you like Atlas Shrugged? That speech goes on and on, doesn’t it.

Never read it. But, I did buy my brother a 1st edition cause he liked it. I'm aware of the theme.

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#95

Post by yanderekko »

armchairhacker wrote: post #10

Like most things: EA as a concept is fine. Finding the "maximal" way to improve the lives of others is great, and finding better ways to contribute than charity and volunteering is honorable. The issue is when people take it to the extreme (like someone who literally argued that a person doing mere charity or volunteer work is bad , because they are wasting time and effort that they could've spent making money and re…

>The issue is when people take it to the extreme (like someone who literally argued that a person doing mere charity or volunteer work is bad, because they are wasting time and effort that they could've spent making money and recruiting to contribute more charity and volunteering)

I mean, the concern here is that coming off as an asshole can be self-defeating, not that these views are actually incorrect, right? Seems like it's like being an atheist - an "extreme view" for many and it's a topic that may need to be dealt with with caution sometimes but that's really mostly a critique of the sensitivities of others.

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#96

Post by kimixa »

I feel this is an "actions speak louder than words" situation. Has there been any effective believer in "Effective Altruism" that has actually got past the "accumulation of wealth" stage? Where are their great works of human charity? It's been a concept in many wealthy circles long enough we should be seeing the payoff.

Or is it just a self-justification of their current actions, of wealth accumulation, to be conveniently ignored later?

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#97

Post by drdeca »

imgabe wrote: post #76
ketzo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, I think it was a very explicit dig. The founding idea is that giving $10,000 to save, y’know, four ailing dogs with bad livers or whatever, or a community theater, as opposed to many human lives, is fundamentally wrong. “If you’re gonna give, you should maximize the impact as measured in human life” is fundamentally at odds with many common forms of giving, yes.

The idea that you can precisely plan out the exact optimal path is arrogant and fundamentally wrong. What if the friendships made at a community theater help a troubled kid through a rough patch and instead of committing suicide they go on to cure cancer? Not funding the theater would have been very sub-optimal. Even without far-fetched hypotheticals what’s the point of saving everyone’s life if they’re just going to…

And do you think the probability of the thing you describe (or anything analogous to it but still arising from the same intervention) is substantial?

I’m not claiming that all charity should be done in such an attempt-to-be-expected-utility-maximizing way, as there may be some like, component of how donations for more local causes might do more to improve the character of the person donating, and other things like that,

but I don’t see your view of “but-serendipity, and but-mosquito-nets-is-no-fun” don’t seem like compelling reasons to not look at QALYs and such.

That being said, I personally haven’t made any substantial donations, so if you’ve made even fairly inefficient donations (as long as they were at least a little effective, and not e.g. counterproductive) then your donations have likely done more good than mine have.

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#98

Post by timy2shoes »

wombatpm wrote: post #71
armchairhacker wrote: post #10

Like most things: EA as a concept is fine. Finding the "maximal" way to improve the lives of others is great, and finding better ways to contribute than charity and volunteering is honorable. The issue is when people take it to the extreme (like someone who literally argued that a person doing mere charity or volunteer work is bad , because they are wasting time and effort that they could've spent making money and re…

Seems more Ends Justify the Means when you start talking about future lives saved

That’s the sense I got too, especially after reading the fellatious piece on SBF from sequoia capital. Trying too hard to justify getting rich, because that would theoretically help the world, in the end, regardless of the means to get there.

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#99

Post by xyzzy123 »

joindpp wrote: post #79
wizofaus wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know about "always", but yes, there's a strong rational element behind favouring friends and especially family, and in general others that you're more likely to interact with in the future. For one thing, I'd think confidence that you have family members that will ensure your children will thrive even after you're gone gives peace of mind for most parents. And even if I never actually need help from family or…

In defense of marketing and admin budgets. What would you prefer, a nonprofit where $100 of your donation goes to "providing help" (I don't really know what that means, since money alone can't do anything) or a nonprofit where $30 of your $100 is invested in "marketing and admin" which results in: - the charity has $500 - there are admin humans around to "provide help" (and you're paying them a decent or even above-a…

Yes, I think this is reasonable. I would also like to take a moment to reiterate why so many people are bitter about the marketing / admin angle:

I pay them money. Charity pays consultants to turn that into more money (plus admins to manage the consultants). Consultants determine that a fraction of that money should be used to solicit more donations. Research indicates best source of new donations is in fact existing donors.

At this point charity is spending money I gave them to extract further donations from me. The ice-cream cone is now licking itself :/

Re: The good delusion: has effective altruism broken bad?

#100

Post by yanderekko »

MichaelCollins wrote: post #49
emmanueloga_ wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Effective altruism (EA) is a philosophical and social movement that advocates "using evidence and reason to figure out how to benefit others as much as possible, and taking action on that basis". [1] Seems like a good idea, if only just to have some sort of open-system for rating charities. I suspect the issue is everything that comes around the idea, specially... people. The problem is always people :-). Perhaps a "…

The problem with EA and other utilitarian systems of thought is two-fold. Firstly, you can't predict the future so really you're working off your biases. Secondly, unfettered by principles other than the end justifying the means, you can easily turn those aforementioned biases into justifications for committing horrible acts. Mass murder, or evidently, theft on a massive scale. For instance: "The technological revolu…

>Firstly, you can't predict the future so really you're working off your biases.

Um, are you saying that this implies that people should just throw up their hands and donate to whatever causes since who knows? Surely not. Once we acknowledge that these questions can be tackled empirically, that's what EA tries to do. Is there room for bias in this process? Absolutely. Does that justify embracing some sort of epistemic nihilism? Absolutely not.

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