What sort of criticism is the effective altruism community seeking? I notice much of the prior criticism cited are medium- or high-profile media criticism to effective altruism, in the form of a response to, e.g., William MacAskill’s articles publised on Medium, or Peter Singer’s TED talk. However, from the perspective of effective altruism itself, there isn’t an incentive for it to be popular, or widely read. The important thing to effective altruism is that the criticism of its ideas are noted, and that its critics are engaged.
I ask because I have friends, or others in my network, who might have criticisms of effective altruism. They wouldn’t be as high-profile as some of the published ones above, nor from individuals who have as much professional experience. However, given the low quality of some of the above criticisms, this wouldn’t seem to be a prior concern in its own right. I mean, present university students, and other young adults, are largely responsible for founding effective altruism, so they should be just as capable in making valuable criticism of it.
“Giles has passed on some thoughts from a friend” is one of the things cited, so if a particular criticism isn’t listed we can assume it’s because Ryan doesn’t know about it, not that it’s inherently too low status or something. I definitely want to hear what your friends have to say!
What sort of criticism is the effective altruism community seeking? I notice much of the prior criticism cited are medium- or high-profile media criticism to effective altruism, in the form of a response to, e.g., William MacAskill’s articles publised on Medium, or Peter Singer’s TED talk. However, from the perspective of effective altruism itself, there isn’t an incentive for it to be popular, or widely read. The important thing to effective altruism is that the criticism of its ideas are noted, and that its critics are engaged.
I ask because I have friends, or others in my network, who might have criticisms of effective altruism. They wouldn’t be as high-profile as some of the published ones above, nor from individuals who have as much professional experience. However, given the low quality of some of the above criticisms, this wouldn’t seem to be a prior concern in its own right. I mean, present university students, and other young adults, are largely responsible for founding effective altruism, so they should be just as capable in making valuable criticism of it.
“Giles has passed on some thoughts from a friend” is one of the things cited, so if a particular criticism isn’t listed we can assume it’s because Ryan doesn’t know about it, not that it’s inherently too low status or something. I definitely want to hear what your friends have to say!