Do you think this language is well-suited for any audience, for specific audiences, or should it just be the default when we don’t know the audience?
On the one hand, it seems plausible to me that we’re automatically using the sort of language we would feel drawn to. (And by “we” I’ll henceforth mean the people for whom this is actually true.) Since we’re the sort of people who got interested in EA, other people who are the same sort of people might also feel drawn to the same language. That may be because it signals scienciness, objectivity, etc. or because it distinguishes us from the average charity pamphlet.
On the other hand, that would limit us to just the people who are like us, greatly reducing our recall rate in society. There are surely great EAs who are very unlike us, and if millions of people slightly improve their giving, that would also have a great impact. This maybe comes down to what is more tractable, narrow and thorough or broad and light.
I’m still thinking about what is the best public for effective altruism, what should be the size of the movement and so on. But the first thing that comes to mind based on many recent discussions is that we need more people doing Earning to Give and doing good Outreach. People that aren’t like us can also do those things really well, so It’s seems good to reach out to them using a language that is slightly different than the one we normally use.
We should never stop talking about rationality. It’s a really important component of effective altruism.
“Combining empathy and rationality to have a greater positive impact” seems like a decent slogan for effective altruism. I think It’s desirable for EA to be automatically associate with both “empathy” and “rationality”. I think there aren’t many drawbacks to this, but I’m really open about it.
Yeah, “reason” might be an alternative for people that would understand rationality in an unintended (straw vulcan) way. “Prudence” maybe too, but it seems less specific.
Awesome, thank you!
Do you think this language is well-suited for any audience, for specific audiences, or should it just be the default when we don’t know the audience?
On the one hand, it seems plausible to me that we’re automatically using the sort of language we would feel drawn to. (And by “we” I’ll henceforth mean the people for whom this is actually true.) Since we’re the sort of people who got interested in EA, other people who are the same sort of people might also feel drawn to the same language. That may be because it signals scienciness, objectivity, etc. or because it distinguishes us from the average charity pamphlet.
On the other hand, that would limit us to just the people who are like us, greatly reducing our recall rate in society. There are surely great EAs who are very unlike us, and if millions of people slightly improve their giving, that would also have a great impact. This maybe comes down to what is more tractable, narrow and thorough or broad and light.
Thanks :)
I’m still thinking about what is the best public for effective altruism, what should be the size of the movement and so on. But the first thing that comes to mind based on many recent discussions is that we need more people doing Earning to Give and doing good Outreach. People that aren’t like us can also do those things really well, so It’s seems good to reach out to them using a language that is slightly different than the one we normally use.
We should never stop talking about rationality. It’s a really important component of effective altruism.
“Combining empathy and rationality to have a greater positive impact” seems like a decent slogan for effective altruism. I think It’s desirable for EA to be automatically associate with both “empathy” and “rationality”. I think there aren’t many drawbacks to this, but I’m really open about it.
Yeah, “reason” might be an alternative for people that would understand rationality in an unintended (straw vulcan) way. “Prudence” maybe too, but it seems less specific.