Within EA, criticism is acceptable, even encouraged, if it lies within particular boundaries, and when it is expressed in suitable terms. … As a community, however, we remain remarkably resistant to deep critiques.
I would say your linkpost sits more within the “Deep Critique” space, to which EAs have a knee-jerk reaction to interpret as bad-faith or unfair.
But don’t let that you stop you please, otherwise the culture in this community will never improve.
Is there any intellectual movement that is actually receptive to “deep critiques”? The counter I made to this particular point in that original post was that if any such movement were to accept deep critiques of itself it would cease to exist.
It also doesn’t help that this particular linked critique is bad faith too.
I still agree it’s good to look for critiques and like you I commend alex for doing so, I just think this particular critique requires a lot of unpacking/work to find much of value for EA/EAs.
The problem I am trying to communicate is less so about agreeing with deep critiques, and more-so about attacking the authors of critiques personally.
This is where I think EA (or more fairly—this specific forum) underperforms other intellectual movements. e.g. Physicists, philosophers, social scientists can disagree about different theories in deep but respectful and professional ways. In EA however, deep criticism is received very personally by the community, leading to emotional/personal attacks on character.
There is this great post that notes that:
I would say your linkpost sits more within the “Deep Critique” space, to which EAs have a knee-jerk reaction to interpret as bad-faith or unfair.
But don’t let that you stop you please, otherwise the culture in this community will never improve.
Is there any intellectual movement that is actually receptive to “deep critiques”? The counter I made to this particular point in that original post was that if any such movement were to accept deep critiques of itself it would cease to exist.
It also doesn’t help that this particular linked critique is bad faith too.
I still agree it’s good to look for critiques and like you I commend alex for doing so, I just think this particular critique requires a lot of unpacking/work to find much of value for EA/EAs.
The problem I am trying to communicate is less so about agreeing with deep critiques, and more-so about attacking the authors of critiques personally.
This is where I think EA (or more fairly—this specific forum) underperforms other intellectual movements. e.g. Physicists, philosophers, social scientists can disagree about different theories in deep but respectful and professional ways. In EA however, deep criticism is received very personally by the community, leading to emotional/personal attacks on character.