This has sometimes led to tensions between effective altruists, especially over the question of how valuable pure extinction risk reduction is.
Sorry to hear that. I think your post is a very good idea that might usefully be replicated for any tense disagreement within EA.
I was wondering a bit what might lead to tensions here, without having any inside view into the long-termist community. Your essay seems to suggest that proponents of both philosophies might forget, or not immidiately see, the room for cooperation, and slide into a competitive spirit over EA resources.
I’ve also heard somewhere that the negative utilitarian “If you could kill everybody painlessly in their sleep, would you do it?” thought experiment can give an initial impression of uncooperative attitudes, like one would work on opposing strategies.
Personally, I also vaguely remember reading an expected value estimate for the long-term future by Brian Tomasik and finding it a bit depressing. I can imagine that some people worry that a pessimistic outlook on the future might be draining. For example, I understood the “existential hope” work of the FLI as a reaction to a worry like that.
Sorry to hear that. I think your post is a very good idea that might usefully be replicated for any tense disagreement within EA.
I was wondering a bit what might lead to tensions here, without having any inside view into the long-termist community. Your essay seems to suggest that proponents of both philosophies might forget, or not immidiately see, the room for cooperation, and slide into a competitive spirit over EA resources.
I’ve also heard somewhere that the negative utilitarian “If you could kill everybody painlessly in their sleep, would you do it?” thought experiment can give an initial impression of uncooperative attitudes, like one would work on opposing strategies.
Personally, I also vaguely remember reading an expected value estimate for the long-term future by Brian Tomasik and finding it a bit depressing. I can imagine that some people worry that a pessimistic outlook on the future might be draining. For example, I understood the “existential hope” work of the FLI as a reaction to a worry like that.