This is a bit of a nitpick, but I wonder if it’s a bit strong to label people who said ‘yes’ to all three questions as “identifiers” and to say that they “identify as an EA.”
I can imagine quite a few people would say yes when asked “Could you, however loosely, be described as ‘an Effective Altruist’?” but would say no when asked “do you identify as an EA” or even “do you, however loosely, identify as an EA?”
“Could you be described” seems to focus on how other people would describe you and seems to set the bar pretty low—around “would it be unreasonable for somebody to describe you as X” or “does anybody at all describe you as X.”
I’d usually only say that someone identifies as ‘X’ if they describe themselves as X or they think X is a good description of them or they prefer to be described as X.
This may be a very minor point and there might not be all that many people who say they “could, however loosely, be described as an EA” but who do not identify, however loosely, as an EA. For what it’s worth, I think there were a couple of years where I myself fell into this category but it wouldn’t really surprise me if I wasn’t representative..
Agreed. When I was reading the article, I thought, “Oh yes! I’m a subscriber. What a clever way of describing me.”
When I read the actual questions, I realized there’s no way I would have been counted as a subscriber. Because I regularly volunteer, other people would definitely describe me as EA, even if I’m a bit on the fence.
It seems like your causality might go this way as well. Rather than “subscribers volunteer less,” the story might actually be “people who volunteer for the community know that others describe them as EA, so volunteers are usually identifiers.”
This is a bit of a nitpick, but I wonder if it’s a bit strong to label people who said ‘yes’ to all three questions as “identifiers” and to say that they “identify as an EA.”
I can imagine quite a few people would say yes when asked “Could you, however loosely, be described as ‘an Effective Altruist’?” but would say no when asked “do you identify as an EA” or even “do you, however loosely, identify as an EA?”
“Could you be described” seems to focus on how other people would describe you and seems to set the bar pretty low—around “would it be unreasonable for somebody to describe you as X” or “does anybody at all describe you as X.”
I’d usually only say that someone identifies as ‘X’ if they describe themselves as X or they think X is a good description of them or they prefer to be described as X.
This may be a very minor point and there might not be all that many people who say they “could, however loosely, be described as an EA” but who do not identify, however loosely, as an EA. For what it’s worth, I think there were a couple of years where I myself fell into this category but it wouldn’t really surprise me if I wasn’t representative..
Agreed. When I was reading the article, I thought, “Oh yes! I’m a subscriber. What a clever way of describing me.”
When I read the actual questions, I realized there’s no way I would have been counted as a subscriber. Because I regularly volunteer, other people would definitely describe me as EA, even if I’m a bit on the fence.
It seems like your causality might go this way as well. Rather than “subscribers volunteer less,” the story might actually be “people who volunteer for the community know that others describe them as EA, so volunteers are usually identifiers.”