Notably, we asked about whether EAs had “experienced any reputational consequences (i.e., changes in others’ evaluation about you) from people not involved in the effective altruism community as a result of believing or acting on the ideas of effective altruism?” in EAS 2020.
A plurality reported no reputational effects at all, and substantially more people reported mostly positive effects than reported mostly negative effects, though a larger number reported a mix.
Response
n
%
95% CI
Lower bound
Upper bound
No, no reputational consequences at all
441
44.37%
41.05%
47.75%
Yes, a mix of reputational benefits and negative reputational costs
307
30.89%
27.57%
34.27%
Yes, mostly positive reputational benefits
200
20.12%
16.80%
23.50%
Yes, mostly negative reputational costs
46
4.63%
1.31%
8.01%
Of course, this was pre-FTX. It would be interesting to see whether results have changed in the next survey. And, of course, whatever the most common effect, results may differ in particular areas (e.g. people working in certain areas of policy).
Thank you for sharing that, I think those numbers are a great addition to this post. It would be amazing to have an update of this post-FTX and post-OpenAI.
It’s good that few perceive reputational effects to be negative, but this strikes me as one question that is in many/most cases impossible to self-evaluate. One can never know about an opportunity not presented due to prejudice or reputation, and often even when an opportunity does present itself, it can be hard to know what factors were decisive.
I agree that sometimes you won’t know whether people think positively or negatively of something (particularly if we’re thinking about individual interactions). But I think very often people will have a good sense of this (particularly if we’re thinking about the aggregate effect), and often people will be quite explicit about this.
Notably, we asked about whether EAs had “experienced any reputational consequences (i.e., changes in others’ evaluation about you) from people not involved in the effective altruism community as a result of believing or acting on the ideas of effective altruism?” in EAS 2020.
A plurality reported no reputational effects at all, and substantially more people reported mostly positive effects than reported mostly negative effects, though a larger number reported a mix.
Of course, this was pre-FTX. It would be interesting to see whether results have changed in the next survey. And, of course, whatever the most common effect, results may differ in particular areas (e.g. people working in certain areas of policy).
Thank you for sharing that, I think those numbers are a great addition to this post. It would be amazing to have an update of this post-FTX and post-OpenAI.
It’s good that few perceive reputational effects to be negative, but this strikes me as one question that is in many/most cases impossible to self-evaluate. One can never know about an opportunity not presented due to prejudice or reputation, and often even when an opportunity does present itself, it can be hard to know what factors were decisive.
I agree that sometimes you won’t know whether people think positively or negatively of something (particularly if we’re thinking about individual interactions). But I think very often people will have a good sense of this (particularly if we’re thinking about the aggregate effect), and often people will be quite explicit about this.