Just a thought on the big picture: EAs have tended to be more comfortable with EAs doing things that many would consider unethical (like being a lawyer or banker) as long as those people use their money or influence for the greater good. But here it appears that EAs want to hold other EAs to higher ethical standards than society does. I understand that this is not a great analogy because an EA organization (especially an outreach one) gets more scrutiny. Still, I think that marketing to a broad audience almost implies a certain amount of exaggeration in order to be competitive. And even though that makes many EAs (myself included) uncomfortable, might it be for the greater good?
My sense is that honest and accurate evaluation of opportunities to do good, and high standards that enable that, has been a core value of EA
I disagree that exaggeration is more effective in broad outreach, e.g. GiveWellās reputation for honesty and care was central to letting it reach its current large scale (and its astroturfing scandal hurt badly because of that)
Accurate communication tends to work better for things that actually are better, and thus has good incentive properties as a standard
In any case, the focus in the document is mostly on InInās interactions with the EA community rather than the general public, and it was precipitated by InInās self-promotion and fundraising directed at the EA community
Thinking people are sometimes mistaken about how they assess different impacts of a job (e.g. most jobs result in increased carbon emissions, pay for the employee, consumer surplus) is not the same as lower ethical standards
Just a thought on the big picture: EAs have tended to be more comfortable with EAs doing things that many would consider unethical (like being a lawyer or banker) as long as those people use their money or influence for the greater good. But here it appears that EAs want to hold other EAs to higher ethical standards than society does. I understand that this is not a great analogy because an EA organization (especially an outreach one) gets more scrutiny. Still, I think that marketing to a broad audience almost implies a certain amount of exaggeration in order to be competitive. And even though that makes many EAs (myself included) uncomfortable, might it be for the greater good?
My sense is that honest and accurate evaluation of opportunities to do good, and high standards that enable that, has been a core value of EA
I disagree that exaggeration is more effective in broad outreach, e.g. GiveWellās reputation for honesty and care was central to letting it reach its current large scale (and its astroturfing scandal hurt badly because of that)
Accurate communication tends to work better for things that actually are better, and thus has good incentive properties as a standard
In any case, the focus in the document is mostly on InInās interactions with the EA community rather than the general public, and it was precipitated by InInās self-promotion and fundraising directed at the EA community
Thinking people are sometimes mistaken about how they assess different impacts of a job (e.g. most jobs result in increased carbon emissions, pay for the employee, consumer surplus) is not the same as lower ethical standards
Fair enoughājust thought I would ask.