EA’s goal is impact, not growth for its own sake. Because cost-effectiveness can vary by 100x or more, shifting one person’s career from a typical path to a highly impactful one is equivalent to adding a hundred contributors. I agree with the EA stance that the former is often more feasible.
This doesn’t fully address why we maintain a soft tone outwardly, but it does imply we could afford to be a bit less soft inwardly. I predict that SMA will surpass EA in numbers, while EA will be ahead of SMA in terms of impact.
I think this creates a false dichotomy between growth and impact. If 1% of the global middle class gave effectively, that would dwarf all current EA funding—even at 1/​100th the per-person impact.
More crucially, broad movements create the conditions for high-impact work to succeed. Try getting AI safety regulation or pandemic prevention funding in a world where altruism remains niche. The abolitionists needed both William Wilberforce and a mass movement.
Your prediction may be right—perhaps SMA will have numbers and EA will have impact per person. That’s precisely why both are valuable. SMA normalizes caring about important problems; EA ensures the most dedicated people are optimally deployed.
EA’s goal is impact, not growth for its own sake. Because cost-effectiveness can vary by 100x or more, shifting one person’s career from a typical path to a highly impactful one is equivalent to adding a hundred contributors. I agree with the EA stance that the former is often more feasible.
This doesn’t fully address why we maintain a soft tone outwardly, but it does imply we could afford to be a bit less soft inwardly. I predict that SMA will surpass EA in numbers, while EA will be ahead of SMA in terms of impact.
I think this creates a false dichotomy between growth and impact. If 1% of the global middle class gave effectively, that would dwarf all current EA funding—even at 1/​100th the per-person impact.
More crucially, broad movements create the conditions for high-impact work to succeed. Try getting AI safety regulation or pandemic prevention funding in a world where altruism remains niche. The abolitionists needed both William Wilberforce and a mass movement.
Your prediction may be right—perhaps SMA will have numbers and EA will have impact per person. That’s precisely why both are valuable. SMA normalizes caring about important problems; EA ensures the most dedicated people are optimally deployed.