These are good well-established concepts. I have some suggestions that are styled more as subjective advice that I would give to newcomers based on my experience.
System 1 and System 2 in applied rationality: people often have low motivation if their intuitions conflict with their analysis. If you’re pretty sure something is correct, it’s good to support it with emotional drivers like friendship or chocolate.
Signalling: if you’re trying to model why people do good, a lot of it can be explained by assuming that they are trying to make themselves good. It seems like it might be a major driver of charitable behaviour.
Pitfalls of expected value thinking: we’re not perfect reasoning machines, and we shouldn’t try to be. If you try to evaluate the expected value of everything, then you might spend too much time paralysed, or you might become untrustworthy. It’s important not to just act in a way that would make you look like an extreme effective altruist but to act in a way that will make you a good ally too. (cf signalling)
Virtue ethics: If you want to do good, it often pays to get into a habit of doing good. This means practising being nice, being generous, being successful, being thoughtful, being scholarly, being loyal, and so on. Not at the expense of thinking independently, but in order to be happily coexist with most of your neighbours most of the time.
System 1 and System 2 in applied rationality: people often have low motivation if their intuitions conflict with their analysis. If you’re pretty sure something is correct, it’s good to support it with emotional drivers like friendship or chocolate.
Signalling: if you’re trying to model why people do good, a lot of it can be explained by assuming that they are trying to make themselves good. It seems like it might be a major driver of charitable behaviour.
One additional piece of advice that I might mention relating to these two points: it’s fine to act out of selfish motives. If you realize that you’re actually working on some altruistic project because you want to gain status, get social approval, make a good impression on people of your preferred sex(es) - great! If those motives cause you to work harder on worthwhile projects, then there’s no point in beating yourself up for being human and caring about yourself as well. Just be honest to yourself about your motives, whatever they are.
Often we might tell ourselves that we’re doing something for an altruistic reason, while in our gut we don’t realize until later that we’re really doing something that looks like it could be for very selfish reasons. Also, human brains are enough of a kludge that we can act for different reasons. Cooperation is helping others in a way that also helps oneself: it’s selfish and altruistic.
These are good well-established concepts. I have some suggestions that are styled more as subjective advice that I would give to newcomers based on my experience.
System 1 and System 2 in applied rationality: people often have low motivation if their intuitions conflict with their analysis. If you’re pretty sure something is correct, it’s good to support it with emotional drivers like friendship or chocolate.
Signalling: if you’re trying to model why people do good, a lot of it can be explained by assuming that they are trying to make themselves good. It seems like it might be a major driver of charitable behaviour.
Pitfalls of expected value thinking: we’re not perfect reasoning machines, and we shouldn’t try to be. If you try to evaluate the expected value of everything, then you might spend too much time paralysed, or you might become untrustworthy. It’s important not to just act in a way that would make you look like an extreme effective altruist but to act in a way that will make you a good ally too. (cf signalling)
Virtue ethics: If you want to do good, it often pays to get into a habit of doing good. This means practising being nice, being generous, being successful, being thoughtful, being scholarly, being loyal, and so on. Not at the expense of thinking independently, but in order to be happily coexist with most of your neighbours most of the time.
Thanks, this is good advice.
One additional piece of advice that I might mention relating to these two points: it’s fine to act out of selfish motives. If you realize that you’re actually working on some altruistic project because you want to gain status, get social approval, make a good impression on people of your preferred sex(es) - great! If those motives cause you to work harder on worthwhile projects, then there’s no point in beating yourself up for being human and caring about yourself as well. Just be honest to yourself about your motives, whatever they are.
+1
Often we might tell ourselves that we’re doing something for an altruistic reason, while in our gut we don’t realize until later that we’re really doing something that looks like it could be for very selfish reasons. Also, human brains are enough of a kludge that we can act for different reasons. Cooperation is helping others in a way that also helps oneself: it’s selfish and altruistic.