This is a good summary of my position. I also agree that a significant part of the reason for the three major cause areas is history, but think that this answers a slightly different question from the one I’m approaching. It’s not surprising, from the outside, that people who want to good, and have interests in common with major figures like Peter Singer, are more likely to get heavily involved with the EA movement than people who want to do good and have other values/interests. However, from the inside it doesn’t give an account of why the people who do wind up involved with EA find the issue personally important, certainly the answer is unlikely to be “because it is important to Peter Singer”. I’d count myself in this category, of people who share values with major figures in the movement, were in part selected for by the movement on this basis, and also, personally, care a very great deal about factory farming, more so that even cause areas I think might be more important from an EV perspective. This is as much an account of my own feelings that I think applies to others as anything else.
This is a good summary of my position. I also agree that a significant part of the reason for the three major cause areas is history, but think that this answers a slightly different question from the one I’m approaching. It’s not surprising, from the outside, that people who want to good, and have interests in common with major figures like Peter Singer, are more likely to get heavily involved with the EA movement than people who want to do good and have other values/interests. However, from the inside it doesn’t give an account of why the people who do wind up involved with EA find the issue personally important, certainly the answer is unlikely to be “because it is important to Peter Singer”. I’d count myself in this category, of people who share values with major figures in the movement, were in part selected for by the movement on this basis, and also, personally, care a very great deal about factory farming, more so that even cause areas I think might be more important from an EV perspective. This is as much an account of my own feelings that I think applies to others as anything else.