One of the first definitions I see when looking up pathological is “involving or caused by a physical or mental disease” (albeit along with “compulsive, obsessive”), and the connotation of “pathological” is really negative and insulting. EA already faces accusations of being elitist and insulting to other causes, which may undermine its appeal to some people, and I am fairly skeptical of the idea that this “social stick” (as you call it) will actually be effective at persuading people who don’t already share your point of view.
Therefore, I am really averse to calling things like playpumps “pathological altruism.” There are a few things which are quite actively and (this is important) clearly harmful and thus probably warrant condemnation: for example, some situations where someone is enabling a drug habit. However, society already does have norms against many of these things, and there doesn’t need to be some new “EA social stick.”
One of the first definitions I see when looking up pathological is “involving or caused by a physical or mental disease” (albeit along with “compulsive, obsessive”), and the connotation of “pathological” is really negative and insulting. EA already faces accusations of being elitist and insulting to other causes, which may undermine its appeal to some people, and I am fairly skeptical of the idea that this “social stick” (as you call it) will actually be effective at persuading people who don’t already share your point of view.
Therefore, I am really averse to calling things like playpumps “pathological altruism.” There are a few things which are quite actively and (this is important) clearly harmful and thus probably warrant condemnation: for example, some situations where someone is enabling a drug habit. However, society already does have norms against many of these things, and there doesn’t need to be some new “EA social stick.”