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Which isn't to say that either is so unforgiveably horrible, just that it's very funny to see someone try to make this case without a shred of self-awareness.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Surely their reputation is a factor in their ability to do good? True. But the EA crowd has a hard time understand perception or empathy and has to resort to mathematical calculations I could think of a couple of ways better than "buying a castle" for conferences.
e/acc is short for effective accelerationism and not effective altruism. Those groups are interested in very different things.
> The vast majority of donors, 98 to 99 percent, don’t have kidney failure later on. And those who do get bumped up to the top of the waiting list due to their donation. Can’t help but picture a roller coaster queue wrapping around the back of a hospital, and some guy is cutting the “Singles” line, defending himself from scowls with, “I’m not cutting! I’m just getting my kidney back!”
(Not even sure this is an option, orientation and all, just imaging)
I respect the British organizers’ willingness to sacrifice their reputation on the altar of doing what was actually good instead of just good-looking. Surely their reputation is a factor in their ability to do good? Optics sometimes necessitate sacrificing the "mathematically superior choice" for one that's worse in the name of not pissing off a ton of people the support of whom you rely upon.
There was a lot of criticism coming from inside the EA community, too. It became taboo to criticize it with multiple EA figureheads (author of this article included) making definitive statements that any critics were wrong and the decision was unequivocally right.
This does honestly kind of shock me, it’s respectable that he did something like this for a random person but I could never imagine myself doing it for anyone except close family. I used to think EA was some kooky AI safety Cult but if so many EA folks donate their kidney, my opinion of them has improved far more. They at least have balls!
Well... maybe they're both. Plus a kooky crypto-embezzlement cult. Probably depends on who you get. My skepticism to the EA movement is of the form: I can respect the underlying idea but I have very little faith in many of the actual people to do it. Also, EA sorta bakes in utilitarianism as a premise and (from my experiences in the ACX comment section) basically finds any non-utilitarian argument to be literally uni…
People can follow a value systems and still understand that other value systems exist.
The EA view of things is pretty simple to understand. Given the premise of limited resources, and a belief that all lives are worth the same, how can you best improve human livelihood?
Different people approach giving back to society in different ways. The EA way to approach the above is to crunch numbers and find what they think is the place where their limited resources can have have the largest impact.
My best friend's family does their part by joining their church to volunteer at food kitchens in poorer neighborhoods and hosting fundraisers for various causes throughout the year.
A Vietnamese coworker of mine used to give back by donating to a charity that gave scholarship opportunities to high achieving low income students in Vietnam.
It's not that complex to understand that different people have different value systems and how they view their tribe, people and the world.
And yes I agree that lots of people find people who hold differing views incomprehensible, but that's also normal aspect of humanity and not unique to those in EA.
From political differences, to philosophical differences, to religious differences, to any topic, many people have a hard time comprehending the worldview of others.
You can even just take the perspective from this article. There are a whole swath of people I've known that could not comprehend the idea that someone would be willing to give their kidney to a total stranger. They might understand if its someone the person knows, but a total stranger? Some might say that's insane and irrational behavior.
Lots of people can't see past their own perspectives on things, but I think it's uncharitable to suggest that EA is not just like any other group with some portion of people like that.
I respect the British organizers’ willingness to sacrifice their reputation on the altar of doing what was actually good instead of just good-looking. Surely their reputation is a factor in their ability to do good? Optics sometimes necessitate sacrificing the "mathematically superior choice" for one that's worse in the name of not pissing off a ton of people the support of whom you rely upon.
The way this post leaves no room for debate about how the decision was good and paints all of the people who disagree as ignorant outsiders feels very disingenuous. There was a lot of criticism coming from inside the EA community, too. It became taboo to criticize it with multiple EA figureheads (author of this article included) making definitive statements that any critics were wrong and the decision was unequivocal…
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This is about as bad and ethically compromised a take as someone who hates crypto-bros and would immediately cease all contact with anyone they identify as pro-cryptocurrency (say believe it superior to the current financial system) and blackball them from all business interests. Justifying doing so to protect their wealth because they know for a fact that all those damn crypto-bros are utter pieces of shit. I have a…
It's human nature to feel good about themselves by doing certain "altruistic" things. Make no mistake the donor benefits more than the recipient.
How much would you say the donor benefits?