I absolutely agree! To put it more plainly I intuit that this distinction is a core cause of tension in the EA community, and is the single most important discussion to have with regards to how EA plans to grow our impact over time.
I’ve come down on the side of social capital not because I believe the public is always right, or that we should put every topic to a sort of ‘wisdom of the crowds’ referendum. I actually think that a core strength of EA and rationalism in general is the refusal to accept popular consensus on face value.
Over time it seems from my perspective that EA has leaned too far in the direction of supporting outlandish and difficult to explain cause areas, without giving any thought to convincing the public of these arguments. AI Safety is a great example here. Regardless of your AI timelines or priors on how likely AGI is to come about, it seems like a mistake to me that so much AI Safety research and discussion is gated. Most of the things EA talks about with regard to the field would absolutely freak out the general public—I know this from running a local community organization.
In the end if we want to grow and become an effective movement, we have to at least optimize for attracting workers in tech, academia, etc. If many of our core arguments cease to be compelling to these groups, we should take a look at our messaging and try to keep the core of the idea while tweaking how it’s communicated.
″ Most of the things EA talks about with regard to the field would absolutely freak out the general public”—This is precisely what worries me and presumably others in the field. Freaking people out is a great way of making them take wild, impulsive actions that are equally likely to be net-negative as net-positive. Communication with the public should probably aim to not freak them out.
I absolutely agree! To put it more plainly I intuit that this distinction is a core cause of tension in the EA community, and is the single most important discussion to have with regards to how EA plans to grow our impact over time.
I’ve come down on the side of social capital not because I believe the public is always right, or that we should put every topic to a sort of ‘wisdom of the crowds’ referendum. I actually think that a core strength of EA and rationalism in general is the refusal to accept popular consensus on face value.
Over time it seems from my perspective that EA has leaned too far in the direction of supporting outlandish and difficult to explain cause areas, without giving any thought to convincing the public of these arguments. AI Safety is a great example here. Regardless of your AI timelines or priors on how likely AGI is to come about, it seems like a mistake to me that so much AI Safety research and discussion is gated. Most of the things EA talks about with regard to the field would absolutely freak out the general public—I know this from running a local community organization.
In the end if we want to grow and become an effective movement, we have to at least optimize for attracting workers in tech, academia, etc. If many of our core arguments cease to be compelling to these groups, we should take a look at our messaging and try to keep the core of the idea while tweaking how it’s communicated.
″ Most of the things EA talks about with regard to the field would absolutely freak out the general public”—This is precisely what worries me and presumably others in the field. Freaking people out is a great way of making them take wild, impulsive actions that are equally likely to be net-negative as net-positive. Communication with the public should probably aim to not freak them out.