**By ‘spreading effective altruism’ do you mean ‘setting up charities doing effective work’ into developing countries? Because if so, it seems to me that spreading effective altruism as an idea throughout such countries by getting donors to support their own country might counteract spreading cosmopolitanism.
Most Second World nations probably wouldn’t have the most effective interventions at helping humans, you’re right. But look at India and China, both countries have hundreds of millions in extreme poverty as well as millions of people with money to spend. I would think that having an EA organization in each of those countries that evaluated domestic charities, gave talks at universities, and sought out and promoted people earning to give to the media, would have a huge impact. Development expert Mal Warwick estimates there are 5 million organizations in the world helping the poor, mostly in the poor countries themselves, so the odds of India and China each having extremely effective charities would be very high in my estimation. And that’s not to mention that people in those countries can also donate to INGOs with operations in their own country. (I know both these countries already have charity evaluators but I haven’t been able to find out whether they are GiveWell or Charity Navigator types. The Indian one has an English website but it is currently down.)
**I believe the very wealth and prosperity in nations which allows those nations to be more altruistic may be also the same forces which generate consumerist preferences in those nations. So, on a society-wide scale, spreading minimalist values might be on uphill battle.
I don’t think minimalism would be received as weirder than being a serious EtGing, so it doesn’t make sense to me to write it off so quickly. There are already minimalist blogs with hundreds of thousands of unique monthly visitors – maybe if CEA gets in touch with them they will like EA and promote it on their blogs, in their books, and so on. The people reading minimalist books and websites would be more open to EA than the general public, I would presume. Also, an EA could make a minimalist website that focuses on minimalism with the odd mention of EA/EtG so as to get visitors that find the simple life interesting but don’t like to be preached to about donating more.
**Thus, even if this is the case for a large religious charity which holds lots of potential for leveraged impact, it may be impracticable to convince them to change their tactics.
Institutions in general are very slow to change, especially large ones, but I think that the non-profit sector can only ignore evidence-based interventions and effectiveness evaluation for so long. It’s like with the environmental movement. In the 90′s, environmentalism wasn’t as big, but in the 2000′s the public’s expectations have changed and now most companies have to at least claim they are sustainable just to stay relevant.
**To affect religious people, it might take religious effective altruists.
I think the only way EA will grow among a religion is if people see others in their religion doing it. A trickle will grow into a stream. I don’t think EA has any true weaknesses, I really believe that (as a philosophy, not as a movement), so it seems like just a matter of time before religious people start earning to give, donating more based on evidence, etc.
Tip: in the future, for commenting, if you want to show a paragraph, or unbroken portion of text, quoted, preface it with the “>” symbol without any spaces between it, and the first word.
I misunderstood you on what you meant by promoting some sort of effective altruism in developing countries. I understand now. I agree spreading effective altruism throughout China, and India, would make lots of sense.
Effective altruist Kristian Ronn and his friend have launched an effective altruist organization launching a project aimed at helping anyone figure out how to decrease their negative impact on the world. It’s called Normative], and it’s in a contest to be funded. I’m unsure if it’s non-profit, or for-profit. Click here to vote for it.
Institutions in general are very slow to change, especially large ones, but I think that the non-profit sector can only ignore evidence-based interventions and effectiveness evaluation for so long. It’s like with the environmental movement. In the 90′s, environmentalism wasn’t as big, but in the 2000′s the public’s expectations have changed and now most companies have to at least claim they are sustainable just to stay relevant.
By all means we should still try. I think you’re right.
We already agree that it’s religious effective altruists who will likely cause effective altruism to grow greatly among different religions. I’m glad you’re so optimistic. I sincerely believe there isn’t much wrong with effective altruism either. It might be the first antifragile social movement I’ve ever been part of.
**By ‘spreading effective altruism’ do you mean ‘setting up charities doing effective work’ into developing countries? Because if so, it seems to me that spreading effective altruism as an idea throughout such countries by getting donors to support their own country might counteract spreading cosmopolitanism.
Most Second World nations probably wouldn’t have the most effective interventions at helping humans, you’re right. But look at India and China, both countries have hundreds of millions in extreme poverty as well as millions of people with money to spend. I would think that having an EA organization in each of those countries that evaluated domestic charities, gave talks at universities, and sought out and promoted people earning to give to the media, would have a huge impact. Development expert Mal Warwick estimates there are 5 million organizations in the world helping the poor, mostly in the poor countries themselves, so the odds of India and China each having extremely effective charities would be very high in my estimation. And that’s not to mention that people in those countries can also donate to INGOs with operations in their own country. (I know both these countries already have charity evaluators but I haven’t been able to find out whether they are GiveWell or Charity Navigator types. The Indian one has an English website but it is currently down.)
**I believe the very wealth and prosperity in nations which allows those nations to be more altruistic may be also the same forces which generate consumerist preferences in those nations. So, on a society-wide scale, spreading minimalist values might be on uphill battle.
I don’t think minimalism would be received as weirder than being a serious EtGing, so it doesn’t make sense to me to write it off so quickly. There are already minimalist blogs with hundreds of thousands of unique monthly visitors – maybe if CEA gets in touch with them they will like EA and promote it on their blogs, in their books, and so on. The people reading minimalist books and websites would be more open to EA than the general public, I would presume. Also, an EA could make a minimalist website that focuses on minimalism with the odd mention of EA/EtG so as to get visitors that find the simple life interesting but don’t like to be preached to about donating more.
**Thus, even if this is the case for a large religious charity which holds lots of potential for leveraged impact, it may be impracticable to convince them to change their tactics.
Institutions in general are very slow to change, especially large ones, but I think that the non-profit sector can only ignore evidence-based interventions and effectiveness evaluation for so long. It’s like with the environmental movement. In the 90′s, environmentalism wasn’t as big, but in the 2000′s the public’s expectations have changed and now most companies have to at least claim they are sustainable just to stay relevant.
**To affect religious people, it might take religious effective altruists.
I think the only way EA will grow among a religion is if people see others in their religion doing it. A trickle will grow into a stream. I don’t think EA has any true weaknesses, I really believe that (as a philosophy, not as a movement), so it seems like just a matter of time before religious people start earning to give, donating more based on evidence, etc.
Tip: in the future, for commenting, if you want to show a paragraph, or unbroken portion of text, quoted, preface it with the “>” symbol without any spaces between it, and the first word.
I misunderstood you on what you meant by promoting some sort of effective altruism in developing countries. I understand now. I agree spreading effective altruism throughout China, and India, would make lots of sense.
Effective altruist Kristian Ronn and his friend have launched an effective altruist organization launching a project aimed at helping anyone figure out how to decrease their negative impact on the world. It’s called Normative], and it’s in a contest to be funded. I’m unsure if it’s non-profit, or for-profit. Click here to vote for it.
By all means we should still try. I think you’re right.
We already agree that it’s religious effective altruists who will likely cause effective altruism to grow greatly among different religions. I’m glad you’re so optimistic. I sincerely believe there isn’t much wrong with effective altruism either. It might be the first antifragile social movement I’ve ever been part of.