I’m still not sure how to distinguish between EA as a question versus an answer. You mention that the “should” component of my question is not represented in the intros to EA. I suspect that this is a PR move, not a philosophical move. In any case, I can rewrite the question to avoid this. The question might be “what’s the best way to improve the world?” Where EA provides some tentative answers (reduce X-risk, earn to give) and a general schema for answering the question (use the best available reasoning tools to analyze your options and then act on one of them).
Based on the way people in this community behave, they seem to see EA as an answer not a question. Questions don’t seem to generate identity and radical life change. Yet both of these sometimes occur in EA.
In terms of the actual term “effective altruist,” I agree that there are downsides to the term. It can be elitist and condescending. But, I’ve never really seen a better term. My guess is that it’s at least close to being the best available option.
A separate question is how closely the EA meme should be related to sub-memes like earn to give or X-risk. I agree with your concern that we don’t want to be defined by any particular object-level strategy, but I don’t see that the name or identity of EA as currently construed is a problem. It seems to me to be a great strength of the EA meme that we have created a social movement where what people actually do is relatively diverse. My sense of other social movements is that this is not the case.
I’m still not sure how to distinguish between EA as a question versus an answer. You mention that the “should” component of my question is not represented in the intros to EA. I suspect that this is a PR move, not a philosophical move. In any case, I can rewrite the question to avoid this. The question might be “what’s the best way to improve the world?” Where EA provides some tentative answers (reduce X-risk, earn to give) and a general schema for answering the question (use the best available reasoning tools to analyze your options and then act on one of them).
Based on the way people in this community behave, they seem to see EA as an answer not a question. Questions don’t seem to generate identity and radical life change. Yet both of these sometimes occur in EA.
In terms of the actual term “effective altruist,” I agree that there are downsides to the term. It can be elitist and condescending. But, I’ve never really seen a better term. My guess is that it’s at least close to being the best available option.
A separate question is how closely the EA meme should be related to sub-memes like earn to give or X-risk. I agree with your concern that we don’t want to be defined by any particular object-level strategy, but I don’t see that the name or identity of EA as currently construed is a problem. It seems to me to be a great strength of the EA meme that we have created a social movement where what people actually do is relatively diverse. My sense of other social movements is that this is not the case.