It is a pretty common belief among x-risk/​meta focused people that poverty is a good introduction to EA and people will later switch to x-risk/​meta causes.
I think people who believe this _do_ typically acknowledge it: from my understanding they generally think that effectiveness can be tough to get one’s head around, that x-risk and meta interventions can seem weird, and that the most intelligible way to present the concept is to give concrete examples of the kinds of interventions people are already familiar with. This reasoning seems pretty plausible to me. This is similar to the fact that GWWC often starts by giving the example of different ways to treat HIV in order to illustrate cost-effectiveness: it’s not that we don’t think cost-effectiveness should be applied across different diseases, and indeed across different ways of alleviating poverty. Rather it’s that showing the difference in effectiveness between treating Karposi’s Sarcoma and condom distribution is a particularly clear way to show the importance of cost-effectiveness when it comes to helping people.
I’m aware this is the impression you formed while living in Oxford. However, would you mind qualifying this statement a bit more? I’m curious. I mean, you don’t need to name names, but do you only mean some closer to the core of the Centre for Effective Altruism, or do you just mean everyone concerned about more speculative causes?
Of course, this is a request, not a demand. Feel free to not answer my question at all, as i would understand if you don’t want to.
It is a pretty common belief among x-risk/​meta focused people that poverty is a good introduction to EA and people will later switch to x-risk/​meta causes.
Yes—I think it is disingenuous not to acknowledge this.
I think people who believe this _do_ typically acknowledge it: from my understanding they generally think that effectiveness can be tough to get one’s head around, that x-risk and meta interventions can seem weird, and that the most intelligible way to present the concept is to give concrete examples of the kinds of interventions people are already familiar with. This reasoning seems pretty plausible to me. This is similar to the fact that GWWC often starts by giving the example of different ways to treat HIV in order to illustrate cost-effectiveness: it’s not that we don’t think cost-effectiveness should be applied across different diseases, and indeed across different ways of alleviating poverty. Rather it’s that showing the difference in effectiveness between treating Karposi’s Sarcoma and condom distribution is a particularly clear way to show the importance of cost-effectiveness when it comes to helping people.
I’m aware this is the impression you formed while living in Oxford. However, would you mind qualifying this statement a bit more? I’m curious. I mean, you don’t need to name names, but do you only mean some closer to the core of the Centre for Effective Altruism, or do you just mean everyone concerned about more speculative causes?
Of course, this is a request, not a demand. Feel free to not answer my question at all, as i would understand if you don’t want to.