Since there are so many separate discussions surrounding this blog post, I’ll copy my response from the original discussion:
I’m grateful for this post. Honesty seems undervalued in EA.
An act-utilitarian justification for honesty in EA could run along the lines of most answers to the question, “how likely is it that strategic dishonesty by EAs would dissuade Good Ventures-sized individuals from becoming EAs in the future, and how much utility would strategic dishonesty generate directly, in comparison?” It’s easy to be biased towards dishonesty, since it’s easier to think about (and quantify!), say, the utility the movement might get from having more peripheral-to-EA donors, than it is to think about the utility the movement would get from not pushing away would-be EAs who care about honesty.
I’ve [rarely] been confident enough to publicly say anything when I’ve seen EAs and ostensibly-EA-related organizations acting in a way that I suspect is dishonest enough to cause significant net harm. I think that I’d be happy if you linked to this post from LW and the EA forum, since I’d like for it to be more socially acceptable to kindly nudge EAs to be more honest.
Since there are so many separate discussions surrounding this blog post, I’ll copy my response from the original discussion:
I’m grateful for this post. Honesty seems undervalued in EA.
An act-utilitarian justification for honesty in EA could run along the lines of most answers to the question, “how likely is it that strategic dishonesty by EAs would dissuade Good Ventures-sized individuals from becoming EAs in the future, and how much utility would strategic dishonesty generate directly, in comparison?” It’s easy to be biased towards dishonesty, since it’s easier to think about (and quantify!), say, the utility the movement might get from having more peripheral-to-EA donors, than it is to think about the utility the movement would get from not pushing away would-be EAs who care about honesty.
I’ve [rarely] been confident enough to publicly say anything when I’ve seen EAs and ostensibly-EA-related organizations acting in a way that I suspect is dishonest enough to cause significant net harm. I think that I’d be happy if you linked to this post from LW and the EA forum, since I’d like for it to be more socially acceptable to kindly nudge EAs to be more honest.