One reason to believe that inviting Hanania is unpopular, though far from definitive, is the data we have on political views of EAs. About 70% of EAs identify as either “left” or “centre-left” in the EA survey. Very few identify as “right” or “centre-right”. I’d assume, cautiously, the most people who identify as “left” or “centre-left” think inviting Hanania was a bad decision, though I can’t be certain of that, as some Hanania supporters do seem to conceptualise themselves as centre-left. But presumably, also, some people who identify as “centre” (and perhaps even “other” or “libertarian”) are also not fans of the decision to invite Hanania.
Thanks, that is a helpful data point. I speculate, though, that EAs may be less likely to fall neatly into a left-right continuum and so (e.g.) the “center-left” respondents could have quite a bit more libertarianism mixed in than the US/UK general center-left population despite identifying more as center-left than libertarian or other.
I know EA Survey space is limited, but a single question on Forum usage (which could be, e.g., no, lurker, >100 karma, 100-999, >1000 / or could be frequency/intensity of use) would be useful in obtaining hard data on the extent to which the active Forum userbase has different characteristics than the EA population as a whole. That might be useful context when something goes haywire on the Forum in a way we think is unrepresentative of the larger population.[Tagging @David_Moss with the question request]
The only statistically significant results are that people who posted or commented on the Forum are more Center-left (41.2% vs 34.9% for non-Forumites), but less Left (27.8% vs 37.8%).
Thanks! The idea that I (as someone who answered “Center”) am that far right for the Forum population feels pretty inconsistent with my lived experience here. I can think of several possible explanations for that, including that I am using a different yardstick than many respondents, that I’m more “left” on certain issues that have been coming up as of late, and that the distribution for highly active commenters/posters is different.
One reason to believe that inviting Hanania is unpopular, though far from definitive, is the data we have on political views of EAs. About 70% of EAs identify as either “left” or “centre-left” in the EA survey. Very few identify as “right” or “centre-right”. I’d assume, cautiously, the most people who identify as “left” or “centre-left” think inviting Hanania was a bad decision, though I can’t be certain of that, as some Hanania supporters do seem to conceptualise themselves as centre-left. But presumably, also, some people who identify as “centre” (and perhaps even “other” or “libertarian”) are also not fans of the decision to invite Hanania.
Thanks, that is a helpful data point. I speculate, though, that EAs may be less likely to fall neatly into a left-right continuum and so (e.g.) the “center-left” respondents could have quite a bit more libertarianism mixed in than the US/UK general center-left population despite identifying more as center-left than libertarian or other.
I know EA Survey space is limited, but a single question on Forum usage (which could be, e.g., no, lurker, >100 karma, 100-999, >1000 / or could be frequency/intensity of use) would be useful in obtaining hard data on the extent to which the active Forum userbase has different characteristics than the EA population as a whole. That might be useful context when something goes haywire on the Forum in a way we think is unrepresentative of the larger population.[Tagging @David_Moss with the question request]
The only statistically significant results are that people who posted or commented on the Forum are more Center-left (41.2% vs 34.9% for non-Forumites), but less Left (27.8% vs 37.8%).
Thanks! The idea that I (as someone who answered “Center”) am that far right for the Forum population feels pretty inconsistent with my lived experience here. I can think of several possible explanations for that, including that I am using a different yardstick than many respondents, that I’m more “left” on certain issues that have been coming up as of late, and that the distribution for highly active commenters/posters is different.