I feel like the main role of a bulldog is to fend off the fiery, polemical enemies of a movement. Atheism and veganism (and even AI safety, kind of) have clear opponents; I don’t think the same is especially true of EA (as a collection of causes).
There are people who argue for localism, or the impracticality of measuring impact, but I can’t think of the last time I’ve seen one of those people have a bad influence on EA. The meat industry wants to kill animals; theists want to promote religion; ineffective charities want to… raise funds? Not as directly opposed to what we’re doing.
We could certainly use more eloquent/impassioned public speakers on EA topics (assuming they are scrupulous, as you say), but I wouldn’t think of them as “bulldogs”—just regular advocates.
I feel like the main role of a bulldog is to fend off the fiery, polemical enemies of a movement. Atheism and veganism (and even AI safety, kind of) have clear opponents; I don’t think the same is especially true of EA (as a collection of causes).
There are people who argue for localism, or the impracticality of measuring impact, but I can’t think of the last time I’ve seen one of those people have a bad influence on EA. The meat industry wants to kill animals; theists want to promote religion; ineffective charities want to… raise funds? Not as directly opposed to what we’re doing.
I suppose we did have the Will MacAskill/Giles Fraser debate at one point, though. MacAskill also took on Peter Buffet in an op-ed column. I don’t know how he feels about those efforts in retrospect.
We could certainly use more eloquent/impassioned public speakers on EA topics (assuming they are scrupulous, as you say), but I wouldn’t think of them as “bulldogs”—just regular advocates.
This Letter made me feel like there can be organized opposition from ineffective charities
Thank you Aaron, these are great points!