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Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

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Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#401

Post by int_19h »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #206
jfengel wrote: post #12

The worst thing about being smart is how easy it is to talk yourself into believing just about anything. After all, you make really good arguments. EA appeals to exactly that kind of really-smart-person who is perfectly capable of convincing themselves that they're always right about everything. And from there, you can justify all kinds of terrible things. Once that happens, it can easily spiral out from there. Peopl…

About fifteen years ago I got involved with the Skepticism movement. It was great to meet so many seemingly rational people and there was excitement that the movement seemed on the verge of growing large enough to make a paradigm shift in how society acts. But after about a year, I started to really sour on it as I could see more and more things becoming rational by decree and thus beyond question. These were suppose…

"Rational by decree" reminds me of Ayn Rand's "the Collective", which very quickly turned into a similar kind of cult where people would be berated for liking "objectively bad" art etc.

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#402

Post by int_19h »

steveBK123 wrote: post #223
jfengel wrote: post #12

The worst thing about being smart is how easy it is to talk yourself into believing just about anything. After all, you make really good arguments. EA appeals to exactly that kind of really-smart-person who is perfectly capable of convincing themselves that they're always right about everything. And from there, you can justify all kinds of terrible things. Once that happens, it can easily spiral out from there. Peopl…

aren't these all, at their root, postmodern re-implementations of religion? with all the related problems & benefits.

"God is a dream of good government."

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#403

Post by benj111 »

hnfong wrote: post #391
benj111 wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say that the us accounts for less than half of English speaking netizens. UK, Australia, new zealand Canada already add up to a sizeable chunk of the US's population. Then add in 1% of India, or China (I assume some proportion has access outside the great firewall) and you've got a population bigger than the US.

If you add up the numbers of the countries you mentioned (together with 1% of India or China), you'll realize that it's smaller than the US population... US: 331.9 million UK: 67.33 million AU: 25.69 million CA: 38.25 million NZ: 5.123 million IN: 1.408 billion * 0.01 = 14m

Well the 1% was pulled out of my arse.

Point is some very small percentage of the rest of the world is going to dwarf the US. Yes the US will be the single biggest demographic but less than 50% of the total.

I haven't been able to find many solid stats, but eg English language Wikipedia, the US has 22k active editors out of 59k total.

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#404

Post by watwut »

Kinrany wrote: post #326
watwut wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You genuinely believe that this had potential to happen after the issues related to drugs started to show up? Cause it is very very unlikely.

However unlikely it is, naasking is right that OP's comment contains zero new information.

It does not. They started having drug related issues despite thinking it won't happen.

OP disassociating at that point is OP exercising good judgement. It does not cancel out his observation that issues started.

The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation - and it is not even that these people took drugs with that expectation. Instead they took drugs expecting no issues will happen to them.

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#405

Post by naasking »

watwut wrote: post #404
Kinrany wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

However unlikely it is, naasking is right that OP's comment contains zero new information.

It does not. They started having drug related issues despite thinking it won't happen. OP disassociating at that point is OP exercising good judgement. It does not cancel out his observation that issues started. The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation - and it is not even that these people took drugs with that expectation. Instead they took drugs expecting no issues will…

> The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation

As is the assumption that it all went to shit, that's why this "story" is useless as some cautionary tale. "Started having problems" could mean anything, from "life spiraled out of control" to "their mom found out and bitched at them".

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#406

Post by thelastquestion »

As someone who has been invited on several occasions into Bay Area EA groups, my experience has been that many of the people who are involved are more concerned with some grand concept of ethics and skipped over an interest and education in simple decency. While only anecdotal, these reports are consistent with the type of environments I saw that would allow sexual assault/harassment to be more commonplace than in other social settings. Even in college fraternities, you are more likely to encounter someone with the common sense, decency, and willingness to tell guys who take things too far to cut it out. There's much more room for emotional investment and manipulation, and ensuing toxicity, within the groups described in the article.

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#407

Post by watwut »

naasking wrote: post #405
watwut wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does not. They started having drug related issues despite thinking it won't happen. OP disassociating at that point is OP exercising good judgement. It does not cancel out his observation that issues started. The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation - and it is not even that these people took drugs with that expectation. Instead they took drugs expecting no issues will…

> The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation As is the assumption that it all went to shit, that's why this "story" is useless as some cautionary tale. "Started having problems" could mean anything, from "life spiraled out of control" to "their mom found out and bitched at them".

This is their original believe: they convinced themselves that they could harness recreational opioid use to improve their lives, but avoid the negative consequences that “normies” suffered by doing it wrong

This is claim of later: the realities of recreational opioid use caught up with them and they were blind to the warning signs

There is no need for them experiencing the worst of heroine addiction or whatever for them to be wrong and or right. At that point, they has drug related issues so they were wrong.

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#408

Post by naasking »

mistermann wrote: post #398
naasking wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how about we develop something similar for internet arguments, a term that is mutually agreed upon in advance, and when uttered by a participant it kicks off a well documented (and agreed upon) protocol where all participants downgrade System 1 thinking to zero and upgrade System 2 thinking to 11 This used to be Godwin's law. Except by the time that's triggered, your System 2 thinking dialed you to 11 almost always…

> This used to be Godwin's law. Hmmm, let's see: "Godwin's law, short for Godwin's law (or rule) of Nazi analogies,[1] is an Internet adage asserting that as an online discussion grows longer (regardless of topic or scope), the probability of a comparison to Nazis or Adolf Hitler approaches 1.[2]" "a term that is mutually agreed upon in advance, and when uttered by a participant it kicks off a well documented (and ag…

> I see very little similarity between these two things.

I'm not sure what isn't clear: the trigger condition you're looking for is the first comparison to Nazis is made. Except as I said, by the time that point is reached I'm not sure productive discussion is possible.

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#409

Post by naasking »

watwut wrote: post #407
naasking wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The "maybe in next few months they gained something super special" is pure speculation As is the assumption that it all went to shit, that's why this "story" is useless as some cautionary tale. "Started having problems" could mean anything, from "life spiraled out of control" to "their mom found out and bitched at them".

This is their original believe: they convinced themselves that they could harness recreational opioid use to improve their lives, but avoid the negative consequences that “normies” suffered by doing it wrong This is claim of later: the realities of recreational opioid use caught up with them and they were blind to the warning signs There is no need for them experiencing the worst of heroine addiction or whatever for…

> This is claim of later: the realities of recreational opioid use caught up with them and they were blind to the warning signs. [...] At that point, they has drug related issues so they were wrong.

Right, so what realities caught up with them exactly? What "warning signs"? How do you know this wasn't just the OP projecting some bullshit that doesn't actually matter?

Re: Effective altruism has a sexual harassment problem, women say

#410

Post by cutemonster »

n4r9 wrote: post #393
gruez wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The Centre for Effective Altruism has a turnover in the tens of millions Google says that their annual budget is $6M, so I think you're overestimating how much money can be siphoned off. Moreover, given how trendy effective altruism is with young professionals from elite universities, getting a high position will be difficult. Sure, an ivy league graduate could fight tooth and nail to get a position at the CEA that…

Perhaps I'm misled, but Wikipedia says the annual budget for 2021 was $28 million: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centre_for_Effective_Altruis... I see the conversation has gotten ahead of me, but the Wytham Abbey purchase is absolutely an example of my concerns. The justification wasn't much more than "I like going to conferences in big posh buildings and some other people I've talked to do as well".

Makes me think of Parkinson's law: "work expands to fill the time allotted for its completion" -- but this time, "money spent expands to match the amount of donations".

I wonder how to design an organization, where people don't do that. Seems it's hard.

Maybe new metrics: Money-not-spent, and Time-we-didn't-need-to-use. But can be easily gamed, hmm

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