Seems like your first article doesn’t actually engage with discussions about wild animal suffering in a meaningful way, except to say that you’re unsure whether wild animal suffering people are authentic in their beliefs, but 1) in my experience they are, and 2) if they’re not but their arguments are still valid, then we should prioritize wild animal suffering anyway, and tell the pre-existing wild animal suffering people to take their very important cause more seriously.
I’m glad you liked the post, but I wasn’t actually trying to make any points about EA’s weirdness going too far. Most of the points made about electrons here are very philosophically flawed.
I know that you had a paragraph where you said this, but you didn’t actually explain why you thought this or why you thought others were wrong, and far more of the article was devoted to stating why you thought those arguing in favor were inauthentic in their beliefs. This was also argued in a way which gave no insight into why you thought the issue was intractable.
Thanks. I’ve seen gallons of digital ink spilled on wild animal suffering, but from everything I can tell, approximately zero has been accomplished. I’ve known a key wild-animal suffering person since he was trying to seduce a way-underage girl. I have watched his “evolution” over the years, and he is driven (IMO) to show he’s smarter than everyone else, full stop. I can’t speak to the motivations of others, but many seem to be motivated to talk rather than have any actual impact in the world. (The same goes for many vegans, too.)
Thanks so very much for this! Makes an important point in a funny but irrefutable way. I’ve tried to take this on seriously ( https://www.mattball.org/2020/12/repeat-kinda-against-ea-utilitarianism.html ) and Vox has as well: https://www.vox.com/2015/8/10/9124145/effective-altruism-global-ai
Thanks again. You rock!
Seems like your first article doesn’t actually engage with discussions about wild animal suffering in a meaningful way, except to say that you’re unsure whether wild animal suffering people are authentic in their beliefs, but 1) in my experience they are, and 2) if they’re not but their arguments are still valid, then we should prioritize wild animal suffering anyway, and tell the pre-existing wild animal suffering people to take their very important cause more seriously.
I’m glad you liked the post, but I wasn’t actually trying to make any points about EA’s weirdness going too far. Most of the points made about electrons here are very philosophically flawed.
With regards to wild animal suffering, my main point is tractability.
I know that you had a paragraph where you said this, but you didn’t actually explain why you thought this or why you thought others were wrong, and far more of the article was devoted to stating why you thought those arguing in favor were inauthentic in their beliefs. This was also argued in a way which gave no insight into why you thought the issue was intractable.
Thanks. I’ve seen gallons of digital ink spilled on wild animal suffering, but from everything I can tell, approximately zero has been accomplished.
I’ve known a key wild-animal suffering person since he was trying to seduce a way-underage girl. I have watched his “evolution” over the years, and he is driven (IMO) to show he’s smarter than everyone else, full stop.
I can’t speak to the motivations of others, but many seem to be motivated to talk rather than have any actual impact in the world. (The same goes for many vegans, too.)
Strongly downvoted for reasons stated above.