I think for virtually all social movements, I have a saying, and that is “demographics is destiny”. And you may like this or you may not like it. But it is also true for people in effective altruism. It’s been true for people who are libertarianism. So if you look at early libertarianism, say in the 1970s, it had a very particular logical structure. But the actual descriptive fact of the matter was that a lot of libertarians were nerdy white males and some other set of libertarians were non-nerdy, somewhat rural, kind of gun owning anti-authoritarian, very US American white males who had a particular set of grudges. And what you end up getting from libertarianism is some evolution of those socioeconomic groups, which again, you might like or you might not like. But if you’re evaluating libertarianism, you have to think a bit, well, what are the natural constituencies? What will those demographics get you? Do you like all of that? And are you ready for the stupider version of the theory?
So there’s like the Robert Nozick super smart, very sophisticated libertarianism. But of course, that’s not what you get. You get the stupider version. So you have to ask with effective altruism, well, what is the stupider version of effective altruism and what are its demographics and what does that mean is its destiny? I have limited experience in the EA movement, but at least in the United States, and I would readily admit other countries may differ. In the United States, it’s quite young, very high IQ, very coastal, very educated, but broadly people with the social conscience. None of that should be surprising, right? But I think the demographics of the EA movement are essentially the US Democratic Party. And that’s what the EA movement over time will evolve into. If you think the existential risk is this kind of funny, weird thing, it doesn’t quite fit. Well, it will be kind of a branch of Democratic Party thinking that makes philanthropy a bit more global, a bit more effective. I wouldn’t say it’s a stupider version, but it’s a less philosophical version that’s a lot easier to sell to non-philosophers. Just so you end up telling people you should think more broadly about how you should give money at the margin, I agree with that. I’m fine with it. But it’s simply another way of thinking about what effective altruism really is, just as it is with libertarianism, just to understand that demographics is destiny.
I gave a talk to an EA group lately, and I’m always like a troll when I give these talks. That’s on purpose, but I’m saying things I believe, to be clear. I’m not making up stuff I don’t believe. So I said to them all, you EAers, you should be more religious, and a lot of you should be social conservatives, because social conservatism is actually better for human welfare. I didn’t mean that in the sense of government coercively enforcing social conservatism on people, but just people voluntarily being more socially conservative. I said a lot of you should do a lot more to copy the Mormons. Maybe now I would say the Quakers, other groups too. What was striking to me was how shocked everyone was by this point. I’m not saying they should have agreed or not agreed, but they hadn’t ever heard it before. Will McAskill said this in his podcast with me. He said, oh, where are all social liberals? That doesn’t really follow at all. It’s something you can debate. But the fact that so many people took it for granted to me gets back at this point. When it comes to EA, demographics is destiny, and the future of socially conservative EA is really not that strong, but it should be. And after my talk, a woman went up to me and she came over and she whispered in my ear and she said, you know, Tyler, I actually am a social conservative and an effective altruist, but please don’t tell anyone. I thought that was awesome. And of course, I didn’t tell anyone who she was. But the mere fact that she felt the need to whisper this to me gets back to demographics is destiny.
So in part, when you think about EA, don’t just think about the philosophic propositions. Think about what it is, what it is becoming. And again, in the United States, at least, it is a very specific set of sociological connections that will shape its future. I like many of those trends at the margin, but I would say not all of them. And just looking at EA that way would be another way in which I differ from a lot of the effective altruists themselves, noting that when I mentioned social conservatism, they just all were shocked. I don’t think they agreed with me, but for me, the important point was that they were shocked that I would bring up such a thing. They just took it for granted that effective altruist people ought to be social liberals.
The relevant part of the Cowen talk: