Food for Thought 7: Do we Have a Clue?
Food for Thought is a series of events, where we discuss philosophical and practical questions of EA in small groups over food and drinks: We are exploring effective altruism one bite at a time. EA newcomers are welcome; studying the suggested material is encouraged but not required, please RSVP.
Topic
This time we want to explore the topic of Cluelessness (as coined by Hilary Greaves). Analysing and evaluating the outcome of your (altruistic) actions is an important part of EA. But can we even know the effects of our actions? What about all the effects that we cannot measure, the big uncertainties and the unforeseeable consequences? Do we also need to consider them and if so in what ways?
Suggested reading
Evidence, cluelessness, and the long term—Hilary Greaves
For anyone who wants more food for thought we recommend the original paper on Cluelessness by Hilary Greaves:
Where/How/What
We will meet at Lovelite. It is 10 minutes by foot from either Ostkreuz or Warschauer Straße. The best part is, they allow us to bring our own snacks, so we can have a “picnic” there. We just have to buy our drinks at the bar to keep the doors of the place open.
What to bring
Some change to buy a drink—they don’t accept card payment at Lovelite.
Something to eat/snack for yourself.
If you find the time to prepare or buy extra food: something vegan to share would be much appreciated (this can be something very low effort but if you don’t have the time to prepare anything, feel free to drop by nevertheless).
The next food for thought will happen on the 7th December. This time we will discuss how a EA utopia would look like. More information and RSVP here: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/events/XQLsqnz234GAaNZHP/food-for-thought-8-utopia
Someone asked me what my favourite Food for Thought topic had been so far, so I’m linking it here:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/events/xvfup2So7AREKuyxK/fake-meat-real-talk-3-the-capability-approach-to-human
Thank you everyone for coming! As always it was a very enjoyable conversation <3