I don’t think this post has aged well overall, but I’d particularly like to focus on your claim the EAs should seek out Cold Uggies instead of running away from them. I disagree strongly. Cold Uggies are often a useful warning that you’re about to engage in immoral activity by the standards of your own conscience. For example, both EA and the world would surely have been better off if SBF had listened to his Cold Uggies more closely. Often, Cold Uggies indicate the existence of important side constraints that should not be breached. If there are neglected opportunities on the other side, they may be neglected for good reason.
I’m closer to a libertarian than a leftist, and I might have agreed with your argument in 2012. But in the 2020s, after trying one coup already—and now setting loose an unelected tycoon to run roughshod over Congress’ budgetary powers, purge anyone loyal to the constitution, and turn government into a vehicle for personal enrichment and revenge—it’s clear enough to me that the Republican political movement is overwhelmingly a force for bad. Anyone “going Republican” would have to go along with too much of this bad from the inside.
Far from being too hostile to Republicans, too many EAs are naively ambivalent about Trump in particular, and the extent to which his reckless, illiberal, and anti-intellectual political movement is a cross-cutting risk factor exacerbating many forms of X-risk at once, from AII to bio to nuclear to climate change. Republicans must be engaged with where necessary, but actively supporting them likely has spillover harms that exceed the benefits.
I don’t think this post has aged well overall, but I’d particularly like to focus on your claim the EAs should seek out Cold Uggies instead of running away from them. I disagree strongly. Cold Uggies are often a useful warning that you’re about to engage in immoral activity by the standards of your own conscience. For example, both EA and the world would surely have been better off if SBF had listened to his Cold Uggies more closely. Often, Cold Uggies indicate the existence of important side constraints that should not be breached. If there are neglected opportunities on the other side, they may be neglected for good reason.
I’m closer to a libertarian than a leftist, and I might have agreed with your argument in 2012. But in the 2020s, after trying one coup already—and now setting loose an unelected tycoon to run roughshod over Congress’ budgetary powers, purge anyone loyal to the constitution, and turn government into a vehicle for personal enrichment and revenge—it’s clear enough to me that the Republican political movement is overwhelmingly a force for bad. Anyone “going Republican” would have to go along with too much of this bad from the inside.
Far from being too hostile to Republicans, too many EAs are naively ambivalent about Trump in particular, and the extent to which his reckless, illiberal, and anti-intellectual political movement is a cross-cutting risk factor exacerbating many forms of X-risk at once, from AII to bio to nuclear to climate change. Republicans must be engaged with where necessary, but actively supporting them likely has spillover harms that exceed the benefits.