FWIW, I also love your chosen name of Positive Impact Society Erasmus and find it much more relatable and less problematic than if you had gone with Effective Altruism Erasmus. It also sounds like you have good synergy with that name and the mission of the university.
I also agree that even ‘altruism’ can be an unfamiliar word (and/or a technical concept) and therefore worth avoiding in some popular contexts. I liked your example of the made-up group ‘Effective Marnaism’ and how it can sound weird or ideological.
I would support your suggestion of using “part of the EA network” as a way to communicate the wider context of local groups with locally working names. I’ll add that — re: avoiding the unnecessary use of -ism, and re: EA sometimes having an air of elitism — I am decidedly not a part of the informal Goodreads group called Effective Altruists because of the problems I have with its name.
Especially in English, it is tempting to use the shorthand (and/or signaling of ingroup membership) of speaking of “EAs” and “Non-EAs”, which sounds to me idealistic and exclusive in a negative way.
I don’t want to carry a visible badge of identifying as an effective altruist, because to me it sounds like an elitist claim of already being effective, which I see as an empirical and debatable claim. (Many people feel the need to specify their self-identity in the form of “aspiring X” instead of “X”.)
I would join a group called ‘EA network’, which sounds entirely unproblematic to me!
Great post, full of good points!
FWIW, I also love your chosen name of Positive Impact Society Erasmus and find it much more relatable and less problematic than if you had gone with Effective Altruism Erasmus. It also sounds like you have good synergy with that name and the mission of the university.
I also agree that even ‘altruism’ can be an unfamiliar word (and/or a technical concept) and therefore worth avoiding in some popular contexts. I liked your example of the made-up group ‘Effective Marnaism’ and how it can sound weird or ideological.
I would support your suggestion of using “part of the EA network” as a way to communicate the wider context of local groups with locally working names. I’ll add that — re: avoiding the unnecessary use of -ism, and re: EA sometimes having an air of elitism — I am decidedly not a part of the informal Goodreads group called Effective Altruists because of the problems I have with its name.
Especially in English, it is tempting to use the shorthand (and/or signaling of ingroup membership) of speaking of “EAs” and “Non-EAs”, which sounds to me idealistic and exclusive in a negative way.
I don’t want to carry a visible badge of identifying as an effective altruist, because to me it sounds like an elitist claim of already being effective, which I see as an empirical and debatable claim. (Many people feel the need to specify their self-identity in the form of “aspiring X” instead of “X”.)
I would join a group called ‘EA network’, which sounds entirely unproblematic to me!