I happen to know there is an internal justification for this opaqueness
Could you elaborate on what this internal justification is? (Blink twice if they made you sign an NDA and/or if they revoked your access to the relevant Google-doc).
I was the person at CEA who spoke with Constance. I don’t remember asking her to promise anything, and CEA certainly didn’t suggest an NDA. (Though I was surprised to see my private correspondence with her published here, since we didn’t discuss publishing it.)
I don’t think I gave Constance additional insights into the admissions process that aren’t already published fairly widely (see here and CEA comments here). I did give her specific feedback on her application and her fit for the event, and other advice about how to get more engaged with the community but I did not ask her to keep that between us. I agree that we could improve communications, and we are reflecting on that.
I agree that we could improve communications, and we are reflecting on that.
That’s a good start. But the root of the issue was never communications. The root of the issue is that the CEA has a lot of power, concentrated in the hands of relatively few people, and lacks transparency.
So treating this like a “communications” issue is the wrong approach. Because, for one thing, it’s a superficial fix, and does not get at the root of the issue.
And, second, it makes the CEA look bad. For instance, though this is anecdotal, I’ve already heard people in my university EA group make passing comments about how the CEA’s response to this post is reminiscent of a corporation dealing with a PR controversy. So I worry doubling down on improving “communications” will only make these sorts of perceptions more prevalent.
I’m curious if you (or Constance) have any theories about why there’s this differing perception of the conversation. One guess is that perhaps Constance wasn’t (and still isn’t) aware that this information is publicly available?
I’m not sure. She linked to both sources her post, so I don’t think the issue is that she doesn’t know about them.
I did give her quite a bit of feedback on her application and things she might include/ways she might get involved in the future, which would have given her some additional insight into how we think about the process. That might be what she means.
I have the hypothesis that the two of you are just different types of people personality-wise with different communication styles that led to a far larger inferential distance between the two of you than either of you could have anticipated. Possibly also since each of you saw the other as “a fellow EA” this made it even easier for both of you to underestimate how large the inferential distance could be between the two of you.
My understanding is you and Constance only talked for an hour. That doesn’t sound like that long and if anything sounds like the perfect amount of time for both parties to come away confidently and incorrectlybelieving that the object level information had been properly transmitted and understood.
Though I don’t know what the insight was, nor do I know the justification for not revealing it, and even though I currently believe more transparency in the admissions process is probably a good idea given how confused even long-time EAs are—despite all this, I strongly doubt there is anything insidious going on.
And because I had a hard time finding what “government house utilitarianism” meant without being blocked by the paywall of a scholarly article here is probably the most important part found on Henry Sidgewick’s wikipedia article:
Sidgwick is closely, and controversially, associated with esoteric morality: the position that a moral system (such as utilitarianism) may be acceptable, but that it is not acceptable for that moral system to be widely taught or accepted.[17]
I strongly doubt there is anything insidious going on.
That’s not the issue. The issue is not what the organizers of EAG are doing in secret, but that they are doing stuff in secret.
I had a hard time finding what “government house utilitarianism”
The idea behind government house utilitarianism is that there is stuff that is morally acceptable to do in private that is not morally acceptable to do in public. Because if it was done in public, people would know about it, and that would lead to bad consequences. (See here).
Hi Constance.
It’s interesting that you say this:
Could you elaborate on what this internal justification is? (Blink twice if they made you sign an NDA and/or if they revoked your access to the relevant Google-doc).
I was the person at CEA who spoke with Constance. I don’t remember asking her to promise anything, and CEA certainly didn’t suggest an NDA. (Though I was surprised to see my private correspondence with her published here, since we didn’t discuss publishing it.)
I don’t think I gave Constance additional insights into the admissions process that aren’t already published fairly widely (see here and CEA comments here). I did give her specific feedback on her application and her fit for the event, and other advice about how to get more engaged with the community but I did not ask her to keep that between us. I agree that we could improve communications, and we are reflecting on that.
That’s a good start. But the root of the issue was never communications. The root of the issue is that the CEA has a lot of power, concentrated in the hands of relatively few people, and lacks transparency.
So treating this like a “communications” issue is the wrong approach. Because, for one thing, it’s a superficial fix, and does not get at the root of the issue.
And, second, it makes the CEA look bad. For instance, though this is anecdotal, I’ve already heard people in my university EA group make passing comments about how the CEA’s response to this post is reminiscent of a corporation dealing with a PR controversy. So I worry doubling down on improving “communications” will only make these sorts of perceptions more prevalent.
I’m curious if you (or Constance) have any theories about why there’s this differing perception of the conversation. One guess is that perhaps Constance wasn’t (and still isn’t) aware that this information is publicly available?
I’m not sure. She linked to both sources her post, so I don’t think the issue is that she doesn’t know about them.
I did give her quite a bit of feedback on her application and things she might include/ways she might get involved in the future, which would have given her some additional insight into how we think about the process. That might be what she means.
I have the hypothesis that the two of you are just different types of people personality-wise with different communication styles that led to a far larger inferential distance between the two of you than either of you could have anticipated. Possibly also since each of you saw the other as “a fellow EA” this made it even easier for both of you to underestimate how large the inferential distance could be between the two of you.
My understanding is you and Constance only talked for an hour. That doesn’t sound like that long and if anything sounds like the perfect amount of time for both parties to come away confidently and incorrectly believing that the object level information had been properly transmitted and understood.
OP links to insider insight in the “Personal Hypotheses for Rejection” section of the post.
The link doesn’t seem to be working.
You are right. The bookmark to the relevant section in the Google Doc appears to have been removed. Unsure why.
All I know is that Constance got some insider insight from someone at the CEA and promised she wouldn’t share it.
Nice. Nothing like some good ol’ fashioned government house utilitarianism to restore your faith in EA.
Though I don’t know what the insight was, nor do I know the justification for not revealing it, and even though I currently believe more transparency in the admissions process is probably a good idea given how confused even long-time EAs are—despite all this, I strongly doubt there is anything insidious going on.
And because I had a hard time finding what “government house utilitarianism” meant without being blocked by the paywall of a scholarly article here is probably the most important part found on Henry Sidgewick’s wikipedia article:
That’s not the issue. The issue is not what the organizers of EAG are doing in secret, but that they are doing stuff in secret.
The idea behind government house utilitarianism is that there is stuff that is morally acceptable to do in private that is not morally acceptable to do in public. Because if it was done in public, people would know about it, and that would lead to bad consequences. (See here).