Effective Altruism isn’t an organisation though; it’s some combination of:
An attitude (or a question), and the collection or community of people who share it
A movement
A cause, or collection of causes
We don’t normally see a strong top-down hierarchy in these except in some religious movements new and old:
Take the attitude of scepticism towards religious claims, or of asking the question which position on religion has the strongest evidence. Richard Dawkins is the closest person to being a leader of this, but isn’t very close (fortunately, if you ask me!)
The enviromental movement looks like a good parallel, and we don’t see something like the Global Environment Facility at the top of it.
The same goes for the environmental cause. You might find causes which have top dogs, but they’re mostly extra narrowly defined (e.g. the cause of catching Kony).
I agree that the hierarchy seen in e.g. the Catholic Church seems excessive. But I suspect the aggressive egalitarianism of Occupy Wall Street contributed to the movement accomplishing less than, say, the Tea Party movement, which elected a bunch of representatives to Congress.
It’s also not clear to me that the environmentalist movement is one that we want to copy. See e.g. this video of environmentalists signing a petition to support the banning of dihydrogen monoxide (a chemistry term for water). The environmentalist movement has accomplished plenty of worthwhile stuff, and has some great people, but getting dumbed down to the level seen in that video seems like a fate to try and avoid.
The key question with hierarchies is whether the people at the top are thoughtful and competent people. I feel like the EA movement has been pretty lucky in this regard.
The key question with hierarchies is whether the people at the top are thoughtful and competent people. I feel like the EA movement has been pretty lucky in this regard.
Not sure if I agree with this—it seems like that’s the sort of thing all kinds of cults say, before their leaders turn out to be self-interested megalomaniacs who’ve just been funnelling more and more of the cult’s money to themselves. More of an “outside view” would be helpful.
Let’s say I told you I thought my boss at a nonprofit I work for was a pretty good boss. And you told me that this was “the sort of thing all kinds of cults say, before their leaders turn out to be self-interested megalomaniacs who’ve just been funnelling more and more of the cult’s money to themselves”. Do you think that’d be a valid concern?
I think you’re much more worried about this than you need to be. Groupthink is definitely something to guard against, and we shouldn’t assume being high status makes you always correct about things, but cult fears seem generally overblown to me.
Effective Altruism isn’t an organisation though; it’s some combination of:
An attitude (or a question), and the collection or community of people who share it
A movement
A cause, or collection of causes
We don’t normally see a strong top-down hierarchy in these except in some religious movements new and old:
Take the attitude of scepticism towards religious claims, or of asking the question which position on religion has the strongest evidence. Richard Dawkins is the closest person to being a leader of this, but isn’t very close (fortunately, if you ask me!)
The enviromental movement looks like a good parallel, and we don’t see something like the Global Environment Facility at the top of it.
The same goes for the environmental cause. You might find causes which have top dogs, but they’re mostly extra narrowly defined (e.g. the cause of catching Kony).
I agree that the hierarchy seen in e.g. the Catholic Church seems excessive. But I suspect the aggressive egalitarianism of Occupy Wall Street contributed to the movement accomplishing less than, say, the Tea Party movement, which elected a bunch of representatives to Congress.
It’s also not clear to me that the environmentalist movement is one that we want to copy. See e.g. this video of environmentalists signing a petition to support the banning of dihydrogen monoxide (a chemistry term for water). The environmentalist movement has accomplished plenty of worthwhile stuff, and has some great people, but getting dumbed down to the level seen in that video seems like a fate to try and avoid.
The key question with hierarchies is whether the people at the top are thoughtful and competent people. I feel like the EA movement has been pretty lucky in this regard.
Not sure if I agree with this—it seems like that’s the sort of thing all kinds of cults say, before their leaders turn out to be self-interested megalomaniacs who’ve just been funnelling more and more of the cult’s money to themselves. More of an “outside view” would be helpful.
Let’s say I told you I thought my boss at a nonprofit I work for was a pretty good boss. And you told me that this was “the sort of thing all kinds of cults say, before their leaders turn out to be self-interested megalomaniacs who’ve just been funnelling more and more of the cult’s money to themselves”. Do you think that’d be a valid concern?
I think you’re much more worried about this than you need to be. Groupthink is definitely something to guard against, and we shouldn’t assume being high status makes you always correct about things, but cult fears seem generally overblown to me.