I still feel it is compatible with a large range of moral views. I remember having a conversation at an EAG a few years ago with:
a global health EA
me, someone who had been trying to be cause-neutral utilitarian with animal welfare before finding EA, who was becoming more into longtermist causes after being educated on them
a longtime EA who appeared to have climbed the ramp over the years (simultaneous with the EA movement) from global poverty, to animal welfare, to longtermist causes
And the convo went a little like this:
GH-EA: It’s pretty hard for me to take longtermism seriously.. helping people who don’t exist yet.. I don’t really feel like I’m “helping” or could be LT-EA: Yeah it is hard. It was hard for me too and sometimes it’s still hard although it makes sense. I try to keep myself motivated anyway though [assume he was talking about warm fuzzies vs utilons, working on a good team, etc] ME-EA: Oh really? I think I don’t find it hard at all. In animal welfare I never imagined I was helping present animals. I always realized we weren’t going to free farm animals, but prevent farmed animals from being born and living lives of suffering. I never thought I was helping anyone to exist, but I was changing the future to be better. All 3 of us: Huh. [Note: the LT-EA still seemed to find this more interesting than the GH-EA]
I’ve thought about that convo a lot since then and feel it offers a clue… like some people come into the movement primed in some way but others don’t. Or the EA movement itself or the experience of spending time in movement primes some people in some way but not others. But I can’t really put my finger on it, and I assume there are plenty of ways to be primed vs not. And it’s hard to tell who is who or where they or you will end up.
That said it’s kinda moot because now I believe (it sounds like you do too) that focusing on “longtermist causes” is probably also the best way to help nearterm people. I do want people to expand their moral circle to future sentient beings (of all kinds), but the most important thing is that the work gets done. So I don’t talk that much about longtermism anymore. I don’t think it’s been very catalyzing to action, and I want neartermists and even self-interested people involved too.
And on the other side of the coin is, let’s not act like longtermism is so rare...I mean it’s basically why you’ve got parents saying “my altruism is raising my kid” or we’ve got the global push around climate change as a cause of human extinction. Most people already believe longtermism without that ever having been a word they heard. It makes sense evolutionarily that we’d care about the future of our own species I think. Tradeoffs between then-present health and wealth vs. future health and wealth were made many times in our evolutionary path, and those who prioritized [more descendants in future] got [more descendants in future] lol. There may be some people who kinda missed that code, but I think it’s rare, and we should feel pretty confident it’s rare.
I still feel it is compatible with a large range of moral views. I remember having a conversation at an EAG a few years ago with:
a global health EA
me, someone who had been trying to be cause-neutral utilitarian with animal welfare before finding EA, who was becoming more into longtermist causes after being educated on them
a longtime EA who appeared to have climbed the ramp over the years (simultaneous with the EA movement) from global poverty, to animal welfare, to longtermist causes
And the convo went a little like this:
GH-EA: It’s pretty hard for me to take longtermism seriously.. helping people who don’t exist yet.. I don’t really feel like I’m “helping” or could be
LT-EA: Yeah it is hard. It was hard for me too and sometimes it’s still hard although it makes sense. I try to keep myself motivated anyway though [assume he was talking about warm fuzzies vs utilons, working on a good team, etc]
ME-EA: Oh really? I think I don’t find it hard at all. In animal welfare I never imagined I was helping present animals. I always realized we weren’t going to free farm animals, but prevent farmed animals from being born and living lives of suffering. I never thought I was helping anyone to exist, but I was changing the future to be better.
All 3 of us: Huh. [Note: the LT-EA still seemed to find this more interesting than the GH-EA]
I’ve thought about that convo a lot since then and feel it offers a clue… like some people come into the movement primed in some way but others don’t. Or the EA movement itself or the experience of spending time in movement primes some people in some way but not others. But I can’t really put my finger on it, and I assume there are plenty of ways to be primed vs not. And it’s hard to tell who is who or where they or you will end up.
That said it’s kinda moot because now I believe (it sounds like you do too) that focusing on “longtermist causes” is probably also the best way to help nearterm people. I do want people to expand their moral circle to future sentient beings (of all kinds), but the most important thing is that the work gets done. So I don’t talk that much about longtermism anymore. I don’t think it’s been very catalyzing to action, and I want neartermists and even self-interested people involved too.
And on the other side of the coin is, let’s not act like longtermism is so rare...I mean it’s basically why you’ve got parents saying “my altruism is raising my kid” or we’ve got the global push around climate change as a cause of human extinction. Most people already believe longtermism without that ever having been a word they heard. It makes sense evolutionarily that we’d care about the future of our own species I think. Tradeoffs between then-present health and wealth vs. future health and wealth were made many times in our evolutionary path, and those who prioritized [more descendants in future] got [more descendants in future] lol. There may be some people who kinda missed that code, but I think it’s rare, and we should feel pretty confident it’s rare.