It can be tough to see things you’d like do do and to feel that they aren’t accessible to you. (although I think you are correct that 80k, and most of the larger EA orgs place focus primarily on elites)
It seems that you’ve already hit on the major points, so maybe you just need to take time to process it and accept it. But I do what to provide two alternatives:
First, people make tradeoffs and sacrifices. Some of the people you see writing impressive essays about animal suffering or creating a project that gets respect and funding, there are a lot of things that they are choosing to not do. This ranges from the simple (they don’t get the fun of following that new show) to the profound (they don’t spend time cultivate a good relationship with a sibling, or they leave a girlfriend to move to a new country).
Second, some of the people on the EA forum aren’t actually so talented or intelligent or thoughtful or kind. We may seem that way sometimes, and maybe sometimes we are, but we also have times when we are foolish or selfish or blundering. A few different framings:
An academic way to think of it is that we are all engaging in impression management.
A casual way to think of it is that we are all cosplaying as intelligent and thoughtful people.
A analogy is to think of a photographer who takes 1,000 pictures, and 900 of them are bad, 90 are okay, and 10 are excellent; but you only see the 10, because that is what gets published.
To use real, anonymized examples
“John Doe” is a real person, who I have met, and is one the top posters here. I consider him kind and intelligent and thoughtful, and he was thoughtless and inconsiderate once, lacking sympathy for another person’s situation. Does that make him a bad person? No. It makes him human.
“Jane” works hard to reduce the suffering in the world and is well known in her cause area. I also observed her (in-person, not online) being inconsiderate of others and deprioritizing them in a way that benefited her organization and her cause. Does that make her a villain? No. She was stressed and busy and focused on other things and trying to accomplish stuff. It just makes her human.
“EA org with funding and respect” had simple typos on their website
A fairly well-known EA org insisted that they will only hire people for a generalist role with both a specific professional background and several years of leadership/management experience at an EA organization. (which is somewhat ridiculous, as there are only a handful of people in the world who meet this standard)
Job applications (an area I am somewhat familiar with) are often rejected for reasons unrelated to the person’s ability to do the job. Maybe you’ve heard of the idea that candidates get rejected if the decision-maker wouldn’t want to spend time stuck in an airport with them. I haven’t heard anyone specifically reference this heuristic, but I’ve seen similar things: people are rejected because of vibes.
So what I’m saying here is that people (and the organizations that people work for) make mistakes, some trivial, and some major. It is possible that you are looking at other people’s highlight reels, and assuming that it represents their normal performance.
It can be tough to see things you’d like do do and to feel that they aren’t accessible to you. (although I think you are correct that 80k, and most of the larger EA orgs place focus primarily on elites)
It seems that you’ve already hit on the major points, so maybe you just need to take time to process it and accept it. But I do what to provide two alternatives:
First, people make tradeoffs and sacrifices. Some of the people you see writing impressive essays about animal suffering or creating a project that gets respect and funding, there are a lot of things that they are choosing to not do. This ranges from the simple (they don’t get the fun of following that new show) to the profound (they don’t spend time cultivate a good relationship with a sibling, or they leave a girlfriend to move to a new country).
Second, some of the people on the EA forum aren’t actually so talented or intelligent or thoughtful or kind. We may seem that way sometimes, and maybe sometimes we are, but we also have times when we are foolish or selfish or blundering. A few different framings:
An academic way to think of it is that we are all engaging in impression management.
A casual way to think of it is that we are all cosplaying as intelligent and thoughtful people.
A analogy is to think of a photographer who takes 1,000 pictures, and 900 of them are bad, 90 are okay, and 10 are excellent; but you only see the 10, because that is what gets published.
To use real, anonymized examples
“John Doe” is a real person, who I have met, and is one the top posters here. I consider him kind and intelligent and thoughtful, and he was thoughtless and inconsiderate once, lacking sympathy for another person’s situation. Does that make him a bad person? No. It makes him human.
“Jane” works hard to reduce the suffering in the world and is well known in her cause area. I also observed her (in-person, not online) being inconsiderate of others and deprioritizing them in a way that benefited her organization and her cause. Does that make her a villain? No. She was stressed and busy and focused on other things and trying to accomplish stuff. It just makes her human.
“EA org with funding and respect” had simple typos on their website
“Anonymous ORG_XYZ” posted sloppy inaccurate/misleading information.
A fairly well-known EA org insisted that they will only hire people for a generalist role with both a specific professional background and several years of leadership/management experience at an EA organization. (which is somewhat ridiculous, as there are only a handful of people in the world who meet this standard)
Job applications (an area I am somewhat familiar with) are often rejected for reasons unrelated to the person’s ability to do the job. Maybe you’ve heard of the idea that candidates get rejected if the decision-maker wouldn’t want to spend time stuck in an airport with them. I haven’t heard anyone specifically reference this heuristic, but I’ve seen similar things: people are rejected because of vibes.
So what I’m saying here is that people (and the organizations that people work for) make mistakes, some trivial, and some major. It is possible that you are looking at other people’s highlight reels, and assuming that it represents their normal performance.