William I wonder if EA is also, whether we accept this or not, a part of a wider/older historical effort?
I don’t mean just people like Esther Duflo at the MIT Poverty Lab, health economists, bottom billion / development economists, Joseph Rowntree Foundation and its social wellbeing research, Oxfam, IDS Sussex, public health people, epidemiologists and (obviously) utilitarian philosophers ….
… but also older roots such as Quakers like prison reformer Elisabeth Fry and anti-slave trade groups, or various buddhists and Christians prioritising health care, the relief of poverty etc.
Of course many of these will have been less mathematical than many modern EAs, and we could identify other differences. However all of these were to significant degrees interested in evidenced improvements and policy improvement, and some still are.
By acknowledging and exchanging with their existing knowledge bases and experiences, wouldn’t we be better placed to expand and mainstream the best that EA can offer? And be less ignorant about effective and altruistic work and research that has already been done, and lessons already learned, perhaps especially when it comes to creating and maintaining a movement?!
William I wonder if EA is also, whether we accept this or not, a part of a wider/older historical effort?
I don’t mean just people like Esther Duflo at the MIT Poverty Lab, health economists, bottom billion / development economists, Joseph Rowntree Foundation and its social wellbeing research, Oxfam, IDS Sussex, public health people, epidemiologists and (obviously) utilitarian philosophers ….
… but also older roots such as Quakers like prison reformer Elisabeth Fry and anti-slave trade groups, or various buddhists and Christians prioritising health care, the relief of poverty etc.
Of course many of these will have been less mathematical than many modern EAs, and we could identify other differences. However all of these were to significant degrees interested in evidenced improvements and policy improvement, and some still are.
By acknowledging and exchanging with their existing knowledge bases and experiences, wouldn’t we be better placed to expand and mainstream the best that EA can offer? And be less ignorant about effective and altruistic work and research that has already been done, and lessons already learned, perhaps especially when it comes to creating and maintaining a movement?!