What’s a realistic, positive vision of the future worth fighting for? I feel lost when it comes how to do altruism lately. I keep starting and dropping various little projects. I think the problem is that I just don’t have a grand vision of the future I am trying to contribute to. There are so many different problems and uncertainty about what the future will look like. Thinking about the world in terms of problems just leads to despair for me lately. As if humanity is continuously not living up to my expectations. Trump’s victory, the war in Ukraine, increasing scale of factory farming, lack of hope on AI. Maybe insects suffer too, which would just create more problems. My expectations for humanity were too high and I am mourning that but I don’t know what’s on the other side. There are so many things that I don’t want to happen, that I’ve lost the sight of what I do want to happen. I don’t want to be motivated solely by fear. I want some sort of a realistic positive vision for the future that I could fight for. Can anyone recommend something on that? Preferably something that would take less than 30 minutes to watch or read. It can be about animal advocacy, AI, or global politics.
I think the sort of world that could be achieved by the massive funding of effective charities is a rather inspiring vision. Natalie Cargill, Longview Philanthropy’s CEO, lays out a rather amazing set of outcomes that could be achieved in her TED Talk.
I think that a realistic method of achieving these levels of funding are Profit for Good businesses, as I lay out in my TEDx Talk. I think it is realistic because most people don’t want to give something up to fund charities -as donation would require- but if they could help solve world problems by buying products or services they want or need of similar quality at the same price, they would.
I think the problem is that I just don’t have a grand vision of the future I am trying to contribute to.
For what it’s worth, I’m skeptical of approaches that try to design the perfect future from first principles and make it happen. I’m much more optimistic about marginal improvements that try to mitigate specific problems (e.g. eradicating smallpox didn’t cure all illness.)
How much we can help doesn’t depend on how awful or how great the world is, we can save the drowning child whether there’s a billion more that are drowning or a billion more that are thriving. To the drowning child the drowning is just as real, as is our opportunity to help.
If you feel emotionally down and unable to complete projects, I would encourage to try things that work on priors (therapy, exercise, diet, sleep, making sure you have healthy relationships) instead of “EA specific” things.
There are plenty of lives we can help no matter who won the US election and whether factory farming keeps getting worse, their lives are worth it to them, no matter what the future will be.
Thanks. Yeah, I now agree that it’s better to focus on what I can do personally. Someone made a good point in a private message that having a single vision leads to a utopian thinking which has many disadvantages. It reminded me of stories of my parents about the Soviet Union where great atrocities to currently living humans where justified in the name if creating a great communist future.
Grand ideologies and religions are alluring though, because they give a sense of being a part of something bigger. Like you have your place in the world, your community, which gives a clear meaning to life. Being a part of Effective Altruism and animal advocacy movements fulfil this need in my life somewhat but incompletely.
the person in the private message also told me about this serenity prayer: “grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”
And just to be clear, I am doing quite well generally. I think I used to repress my empathy because it just feels too painful. But it was controlling me subconsciously by constantly nagging me to do altruistic things. Nowadays, I sometimes connect to my empathy and it can feel overwhelming like yesterday. But I think it’s for the better long-term.
It might be too hard to envision an entire grand future, but it’s possible to envision specific wins in the short and medium-term. A short-term win could be large cage-free eggs campaigns succeeding, a medium-term win could be a global ban on caged layer hens. Similarly a short-term win for AI safety could be a specific major technical advance or significant legislation passed, a medium-term win could be AGIs coexisting with humans without the world going to chaos, while still having massive positive benefits (e.g. a cure to Alzheimer’s).
Maybe this is a cop-out but I am thinking more and more of a pluralistic and mutually respectful future. Some people might take off on a spaceship to settle a nearby solar system. Some others might live lower-tech in eco villages. Animals will be free to pursue their goals. And each of these people will pursue their version of a worthwhile future with minimal reduction in the potential of others to fulfill theirs. I think anything else will just lead to oppressions of everyone that is not onboard with some specific wild project—I think most people’s dreams of a future are pretty wild and not something I would want for myself!
I don’t have a suggestion, but I’ve been encouraged and “heartwarmed” by the diverse range of responses below. Cool to see people with different ways of holding their hope and motivation, whether its enough for us to buy a bed net tomorrow or we do indeed have grander plans and visions, or we’re skeptical abut whether “future designing” is a good idea at all.
On some level I think the answer is always the same, regardless of the headwinds or tailwinds: you do what you can with your limited resources to improve the world as much as you can. In some sense I think slowing the growth of factory farming in a world where it was growing is the same as a world where it is stagnant and we reduce the number of animals raised. In both worlds there’s a reduction in suffering. I wrote a creative piece on this exact topic here if that is at all appealing.
I also think on the front of factory farming we focus too much on the entire problem, and not enough on how good the wins are in and of themselves.
What’s a realistic, positive vision of the future worth fighting for?
I feel lost when it comes how to do altruism lately. I keep starting and dropping various little projects. I think the problem is that I just don’t have a grand vision of the future I am trying to contribute to. There are so many different problems and uncertainty about what the future will look like. Thinking about the world in terms of problems just leads to despair for me lately. As if humanity is continuously not living up to my expectations. Trump’s victory, the war in Ukraine, increasing scale of factory farming, lack of hope on AI. Maybe insects suffer too, which would just create more problems. My expectations for humanity were too high and I am mourning that but I don’t know what’s on the other side. There are so many things that I don’t want to happen, that I’ve lost the sight of what I do want to happen. I don’t want to be motivated solely by fear. I want some sort of a realistic positive vision for the future that I could fight for. Can anyone recommend something on that? Preferably something that would take less than 30 minutes to watch or read. It can be about animal advocacy, AI, or global politics.
I think the sort of world that could be achieved by the massive funding of effective charities is a rather inspiring vision. Natalie Cargill, Longview Philanthropy’s CEO, lays out a rather amazing set of outcomes that could be achieved in her TED Talk.
I think that a realistic method of achieving these levels of funding are Profit for Good businesses, as I lay out in my TEDx Talk. I think it is realistic because most people don’t want to give something up to fund charities -as donation would require- but if they could help solve world problems by buying products or services they want or need of similar quality at the same price, they would.
For what it’s worth, I’m skeptical of approaches that try to design the perfect future from first principles and make it happen. I’m much more optimistic about marginal improvements that try to mitigate specific problems (e.g. eradicating smallpox didn’t cure all illness.)
How much we can help doesn’t depend on how awful or how great the world is, we can save the drowning child whether there’s a billion more that are drowning or a billion more that are thriving. To the drowning child the drowning is just as real, as is our opportunity to help.
If you feel emotionally down and unable to complete projects, I would encourage to try things that work on priors (therapy, exercise, diet, sleep, making sure you have healthy relationships) instead of “EA specific” things.
There are plenty of lives we can help no matter who won the US election and whether factory farming keeps getting worse, their lives are worth it to them, no matter what the future will be.
Thanks. Yeah, I now agree that it’s better to focus on what I can do personally. Someone made a good point in a private message that having a single vision leads to a utopian thinking which has many disadvantages. It reminded me of stories of my parents about the Soviet Union where great atrocities to currently living humans where justified in the name if creating a great communist future.
Grand ideologies and religions are alluring though, because they give a sense of being a part of something bigger. Like you have your place in the world, your community, which gives a clear meaning to life. Being a part of Effective Altruism and animal advocacy movements fulfil this need in my life somewhat but incompletely.
the person in the private message also told me about this serenity prayer: “grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”
And just to be clear, I am doing quite well generally. I think I used to repress my empathy because it just feels too painful. But it was controlling me subconsciously by constantly nagging me to do altruistic things. Nowadays, I sometimes connect to my empathy and it can feel overwhelming like yesterday. But I think it’s for the better long-term.
FWIW: definitely not a world vision, but Ozy’s blog is the most heart-warming thing I’ve read after the recent US elections.
It might be too hard to envision an entire grand future, but it’s possible to envision specific wins in the short and medium-term. A short-term win could be large cage-free eggs campaigns succeeding, a medium-term win could be a global ban on caged layer hens. Similarly a short-term win for AI safety could be a specific major technical advance or significant legislation passed, a medium-term win could be AGIs coexisting with humans without the world going to chaos, while still having massive positive benefits (e.g. a cure to Alzheimer’s).
Maybe this is a cop-out but I am thinking more and more of a pluralistic and mutually respectful future. Some people might take off on a spaceship to settle a nearby solar system. Some others might live lower-tech in eco villages. Animals will be free to pursue their goals. And each of these people will pursue their version of a worthwhile future with minimal reduction in the potential of others to fulfill theirs. I think anything else will just lead to oppressions of everyone that is not onboard with some specific wild project—I think most people’s dreams of a future are pretty wild and not something I would want for myself!
I don’t have a suggestion, but I’ve been encouraged and “heartwarmed” by the diverse range of responses below. Cool to see people with different ways of holding their hope and motivation, whether its enough for us to buy a bed net tomorrow or we do indeed have grander plans and visions, or we’re skeptical abut whether “future designing” is a good idea at all.
Sorry to hear that you’re having a rough time!
When I’m feeling like this, I find that the only thing that helps is actually finishing a project end-to-end so I feel momentum.
Something I intrinsically think is valuable but wasn’t going to get done otherwise. (Like improving wikis or cleaning up a mess in a park).
Going as small as possible while still being satisfying helps remind me that there are things within my control and people around me that I can help.
I also liked this post from FarmKind
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/aidan-alexander_𝐌𝐲-𝐌𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐩𝐥𝐚𝐧-𝐭𝐨-𝐄𝐧𝐝-activity-7262449165924712451-lb7T?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_android
On some level I think the answer is always the same, regardless of the headwinds or tailwinds: you do what you can with your limited resources to improve the world as much as you can. In some sense I think slowing the growth of factory farming in a world where it was growing is the same as a world where it is stagnant and we reduce the number of animals raised. In both worlds there’s a reduction in suffering. I wrote a creative piece on this exact topic here if that is at all appealing.
I also think on the front of factory farming we focus too much on the entire problem, and not enough on how good the wins are in and of themselves.