I’m definitely in favor of doing experiments, learning by doing, etc. But no amount of these is going to save you from working towards the wrong goal (unless you’re doing experiments to try to figure out if the goal is one that’s good to work towards, which doesn’t sound quite like what you’re proposing here, although I guess your post could be interpreted this way).
The best counterargument I can think of to my position:
EA must either grow or die. Suppose the idea that one should donate a significant fraction of one’s income makes many people uncomfortable, and their natural response is to find some rationalization for why EA is bad. Then in the absence of attaining influence to counteract this, EA’s image will decline continuously as people broadcast these rationalizations.
The only solution is to grow and attain influence before we get killed, i.e. nudge journalism towards our values faster than journalists nudge us towards their values. (#1 journalist value: pageviews.)
I’d say the solution would be to persuade certain people, specifically ones more emotionally inclined than the current typical EA, to be more oriented toward our values. This is a much smaller ask :-)
I’m definitely in favor of doing experiments, learning by doing, etc. But no amount of these is going to save you from working towards the wrong goal (unless you’re doing experiments to try to figure out if the goal is one that’s good to work towards, which doesn’t sound quite like what you’re proposing here, although I guess your post could be interpreted this way).
The best counterargument I can think of to my position:
EA must either grow or die. Suppose the idea that one should donate a significant fraction of one’s income makes many people uncomfortable, and their natural response is to find some rationalization for why EA is bad. Then in the absence of attaining influence to counteract this, EA’s image will decline continuously as people broadcast these rationalizations.
The only solution is to grow and attain influence before we get killed, i.e. nudge journalism towards our values faster than journalists nudge us towards their values. (#1 journalist value: pageviews.)
I’d say the solution would be to persuade certain people, specifically ones more emotionally inclined than the current typical EA, to be more oriented toward our values. This is a much smaller ask :-)