For me, thinking of relationships and hobbies in an instrumental way takes away from how much joy and energy and meaning etc. I get from them. So in practice I expect most “EA dedicates” should instrumentally just live a life of a “non-dedicate”, i.e. to value their relationships with their parents, siblings, partners and friends for their own sake.
Other things make this distinction messy:
How strongly various psychological needs are expressed for an individual will have strong effects for how their most sustainable “EA dedicate” life looks like. For example
the need for meaning,
the need for feeling connected to others, for feeling love,
the need for fun.
How strongly you wish to found a family probably also is not under your control.
Your stamina, e.g. I’d be surprised if I ever be able to productively work 80 hours for more than one week, so I’ll probably never look like I’m sacrificing too much.
Plausibly somewhat innate character traits like risk-aversion, agreeableness, openness to experience, neuroticism will have a strong effect on what lifestyles you can sustainably live or even just explore without draining a lot of energy.
Plausibly how financially independent has a lot of psychological effects that affect how much of an “EA dedicate” you can look like. E.g. I heard that Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is very disputed, but it also seems true that helping others is very commonly given less weight by our motivational systems than making sure that we are personally safe etc.
There is probably a distinction where some EAs would or wouldn’t push the button that turns them into an omniscient utility maximizer who would always just take the action that is doing the most good. I would push this button because the lives and the suffering and the beauty that are at stake are so much more important than me and my other values. But in practice I think I will probably never need the distinction between EA dedicates and non-dedicates.
For me, thinking of relationships and hobbies in an instrumental way takes away from how much joy and energy and meaning etc. I get from them. So in practice I expect most “EA dedicates” should instrumentally just live a life of a “non-dedicate”, i.e. to value their relationships with their parents, siblings, partners and friends for their own sake.
Other things make this distinction messy:
How strongly various psychological needs are expressed for an individual will have strong effects for how their most sustainable “EA dedicate” life looks like. For example
the need for meaning,
the need for feeling connected to others, for feeling love,
the need for fun.
How strongly you wish to found a family probably also is not under your control.
Your stamina, e.g. I’d be surprised if I ever be able to productively work 80 hours for more than one week, so I’ll probably never look like I’m sacrificing too much.
Plausibly somewhat innate character traits like risk-aversion, agreeableness, openness to experience, neuroticism will have a strong effect on what lifestyles you can sustainably live or even just explore without draining a lot of energy.
Plausibly how financially independent has a lot of psychological effects that affect how much of an “EA dedicate” you can look like. E.g. I heard that Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is very disputed, but it also seems true that helping others is very commonly given less weight by our motivational systems than making sure that we are personally safe etc.
There is probably a distinction where some EAs would or wouldn’t push the button that turns them into an omniscient utility maximizer who would always just take the action that is doing the most good. I would push this button because the lives and the suffering and the beauty that are at stake are so much more important than me and my other values. But in practice I think I will probably never need the distinction between EA dedicates and non-dedicates.