Thanks for the post, I think this does a good job of exploring the main reasons for/against community service.
I’ve heard this idea thrown around in community building spaces, and it definitely comes up quite often when recruiting. That is, people often ask, “you do all these discussion groups and dinners, but how do you actually help people directly? Aren’t there community service opportunities?” This seems like a reasonable question, especially if you’re not familiar with the typical EA mindset already.
I’ve been kind of averse to making community service a part of my EA group, mostly for fear of muddling our messaging. However, I think this is at least worth considering. Prefacing each community service session with a sort of “disclaimer” as you’re describing sounds like a step in the right direction, though it also may set a weird tone of you’re not careful. “You might feel warm and fuzzy feelings while doing this work, but please keep in mind that the work itself has a practically negligible expected impact on the world compared to a high-impact career. We’re only doing this to bond as a community and reinforce our values. Now, let’s get to work!”
I’d be very interested to see a post presenting past research on how community service and other “warm-fuzzy activities” can improve people’s empathy and motivation to do good, particularly applying it to the context of EA. Although it seems somewhat intuitive, I’m very uncertain about how potent this effect actually is.
Maybe the process of choosing a community service project could be a good exercise in EA principles (as long as you don’t spend too long on it)? “Given the constraint that they must be community service in our area, what are the most effective ways to do good and why?”
Service once every two weeks intuitively seems like a lot on top of all the typical EA activities a group does. I can imagine myself doing this once a month or less. If you have many active members in your group and expect each member to only go to every other service event on average, this could make more sense.
Maybe the process of choosing a community service project could be a good exercise in EA principles (as long as you don’t spend too long on it)?
I like this idea and would even go further—spend as much time on it as people are interested in spending, the decision-making process might prove educational!
I can’t honestly say I’m excited about the idea of EA groups worldwide marching out to pick up litter. But it seems like a worthwhile experiment for some groups, to get buy-in on the idea of volunteering together, brainstorm volunteering possibilities, decide between them based on impact, and actually go and do it.
Yeah I completely agree the disclaimer needs to be carefully worded ha. It feels like the disclaimer should err towards being a prompt about how we could be more impactful in our local community rather than simply stating that this activity isn’t very impactful. I’m gravitating toward something like this:
This activity is definitely making our community better, because (whatever reason, trash or decaying buildings are bad). But effective altruism is all about finding the most impactful ways to make the world better. As you’re working today be thinking about other projects we could do that would have an even better effect, and we’ll discuss it today or next time.
Thanks for the post, I think this does a good job of exploring the main reasons for/against community service.
I’ve heard this idea thrown around in community building spaces, and it definitely comes up quite often when recruiting. That is, people often ask, “you do all these discussion groups and dinners, but how do you actually help people directly? Aren’t there community service opportunities?” This seems like a reasonable question, especially if you’re not familiar with the typical EA mindset already.
I’ve been kind of averse to making community service a part of my EA group, mostly for fear of muddling our messaging. However, I think this is at least worth considering. Prefacing each community service session with a sort of “disclaimer” as you’re describing sounds like a step in the right direction, though it also may set a weird tone of you’re not careful. “You might feel warm and fuzzy feelings while doing this work, but please keep in mind that the work itself has a practically negligible expected impact on the world compared to a high-impact career. We’re only doing this to bond as a community and reinforce our values. Now, let’s get to work!”
I’d be very interested to see a post presenting past research on how community service and other “warm-fuzzy activities” can improve people’s empathy and motivation to do good, particularly applying it to the context of EA. Although it seems somewhat intuitive, I’m very uncertain about how potent this effect actually is.
Maybe the process of choosing a community service project could be a good exercise in EA principles (as long as you don’t spend too long on it)? “Given the constraint that they must be community service in our area, what are the most effective ways to do good and why?”
Service once every two weeks intuitively seems like a lot on top of all the typical EA activities a group does. I can imagine myself doing this once a month or less. If you have many active members in your group and expect each member to only go to every other service event on average, this could make more sense.
I like this idea and would even go further—spend as much time on it as people are interested in spending, the decision-making process might prove educational!
I can’t honestly say I’m excited about the idea of EA groups worldwide marching out to pick up litter. But it seems like a worthwhile experiment for some groups, to get buy-in on the idea of volunteering together, brainstorm volunteering possibilities, decide between them based on impact, and actually go and do it.
Yeah I completely agree the disclaimer needs to be carefully worded ha. It feels like the disclaimer should err towards being a prompt about how we could be more impactful in our local community rather than simply stating that this activity isn’t very impactful. I’m gravitating toward something like this: