Did it? My sense was only that (a) the amount of money from six-figure donations was nonetheless dwarfed by Open Philanthropy, and (b) as the number of professionals in EA has increased, the percentage of the community focused on donations has been diluted somewhat. But we’re still around!
I basically think so, yes. I think it mainly caused by, as you put it, “the amount of money from six-figure donations was nonetheless dwarfed by Open Philanthropy” and therefore people have scaled back/stopped since they don’t think it’s impactful. I basically don’t think that’s true, especially in this case of animal welfare but also just in terms of absolute impact which is what actually matters as opposed to relative impact. FWIW, this is the same (IMO, fallacious) argument “normies” have against donating “my potential donations are so small compared to billionaires/governments/NGOs that I may as well just spend it on myself”.
But yes, the amount of people I know who would consider themselves to be effective altruists, even committed effective altruists who earn considerable salaries donate relatively little, at least compared to what they could be donating.
Did it? My sense was only that (a) the amount of money from six-figure donations was nonetheless dwarfed by Open Philanthropy, and (b) as the number of professionals in EA has increased, the percentage of the community focused on donations has been diluted somewhat. But we’re still around!
I basically think so, yes. I think it mainly caused by, as you put it, “the amount of money from six-figure donations was nonetheless dwarfed by Open Philanthropy” and therefore people have scaled back/stopped since they don’t think it’s impactful. I basically don’t think that’s true, especially in this case of animal welfare but also just in terms of absolute impact which is what actually matters as opposed to relative impact. FWIW, this is the same (IMO, fallacious) argument “normies” have against donating “my potential donations are so small compared to billionaires/governments/NGOs that I may as well just spend it on myself”.
But yes, the amount of people I know who would consider themselves to be effective altruists, even committed effective altruists who earn considerable salaries donate relatively little, at least compared to what they could be donating.