Appendix A: Impact obsession and other mental health conditions, thoughts on etiology
How EA can reinforce impact obsession and perfectionism
There are several ways in which EA’s philosophy and culture can reinforce perfectionism and impact obsession. (Note that almost none of the following is meant as a critique of EA or as a call for change. Most of it is unfortunate but also unavoidable.)
EA emphasizes consequentialism (rightly so): Your intentions don’t really matter, it’s the actual consequences of your actions, i.e. your achievements that matter, not whether you’re a good person in some virtue-ethical or deontological sense. Generally, other EAs pay a lot of attention to your achievements and praise you if you did something impactful. All of this reinforces basing your self-worth on your achievements (in the domain of EA), which is essentially the core dynamic of both clinical perfectionism and impact obsession.
Conceptually, EA is about doing the most good, not just doing a bit of good. EA discourse emphasizes heavy tailed distributions, hits-based approaches, and how “EA superstars” can have much much more impact than the average EA. This can reinforce perfectionist tendencies like “I have to be great, otherwise I’m a failure”.
Also, making mistakes in EA can be very costly, as the stakes can be very high. Some of your mistakes really could lead (indirectly, counterfactually speaking) to many beings suffering or dying. It’s not like your mistakes might just cost you a promotion. This high cost of mistakes can also reinforce perfectionist tendencies.
Lastly, many EAs—including our past selves—tend to believe that we should indeed aim for the minimum of self-care necessary. These sentiments can lead those who are vulnerable to perfectionistic impact obsession to dismiss the negative consequences of overexerting themselves to reach their demanding standards.
Impact obsession, scrupulosity and OCD
Interestingly, impact obsession seems very related to moral scrupulosity (as briefly discussed in footnote 5). This excellent post by Holly Elmore makes several interesting observations on the relationship between scrupulosity and EA, and what risks to be aware of. Particularly noteworthy is the observation that scrupulosity is characterized by an “excessive sense of personal responsibility [...or] “hyper-responsibility” (in the context of OCD), or the dysfunctional attitude of omnipotence.” A heightened sense of responsibility is arguably another core characteristic of impact obsession. (See also the influential concept of “heroic responsibility”.)
Scrupulosity is usually seen as a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and clinical perfectionism also shares similarities with OCD (Egan et al., 2016, ch.3.; Limburg et al., 2017). Taken together, this suggests that impact obsession shares some characteristics with OCD (which is part of the reason for why we settled on the term ‘impact obsession’) and may benefit from similar treatment approaches, at least to some extent.
More on differences and similarities between impact obsession and perfectionism
Generally speaking, clinical perfectionism tends to be more like a personality trait that shows up in several domains of life. In contrast, many impact-obsessed EAs are not perfectionistic in other areas of life. Impact obsession seems more related to one’s values and overall meaning, whereas clinical perfectionism is usually motivated by the fear of not wanting to feel incompetent or worthless. (That being said, unhealthy impact obsession often is motivated by these fears as well!)
Typical clinical perfectionism is often accompanied by more severe cognitive biases like overgeneralizing, catastrophizing, all-or-nothing thinking, selective attention, and so on. These biases might appear among those with impact obsession but usually in much less pronounced and rigid form. Generally, the patients described in most CBT books on clinical perfectionism are often quite irrational, rigid, and inflexible. EAs might read these books and think “well, I’m certainly not like these people” and conclude that they don’t have anything like clinical perfectionism. This may be true but they might still benefit from working on their unhealthy impact obsessive tendencies. Preventing this failure mode is another reason for having written this post.
Why do some people develop (unhealthy) impact obsession?
Our sense is that those who think in highly systematic, low-decoupling, non-compartmentalizing ways are more likely to develop impact obsession. In a sense, impact obsession is a logical consequence of deeply internalizing ideas and relevant thought experiments like utilitarianism/consequentialism + impartiality, astronomical stakes, the drowning child, and so on.
Speculatively, people who crave some form of objective, cosmic meaning and purpose (but who cannot find it elsewhere because, e.g., they don’t believe in God) might also be more prone to developing unhealthy impact obsession.
Some other idiosyncratic traits seem more common among those with unhealthy impact obsession, such as being disgusted with hypocrisy and other human flaws (especially when reflecting on their evolutionary roots) and a strong desire to not be like this (cf. Hanson’s “smart sincere syndrome”), i.e., wanting to be a hero. Moral scrupulosity and other maladaptive schemas like “unrelenting standards”, “approval seeking”, seem also more common among those with unhealthy impact obsession.
Appendix A: Impact obsession and other mental health conditions, thoughts on etiology
How EA can reinforce impact obsession and perfectionism
There are several ways in which EA’s philosophy and culture can reinforce perfectionism and impact obsession. (Note that almost none of the following is meant as a critique of EA or as a call for change. Most of it is unfortunate but also unavoidable.)
EA emphasizes consequentialism (rightly so): Your intentions don’t really matter, it’s the actual consequences of your actions, i.e. your achievements that matter, not whether you’re a good person in some virtue-ethical or deontological sense. Generally, other EAs pay a lot of attention to your achievements and praise you if you did something impactful. All of this reinforces basing your self-worth on your achievements (in the domain of EA), which is essentially the core dynamic of both clinical perfectionism and impact obsession.
Conceptually, EA is about doing the most good, not just doing a bit of good. EA discourse emphasizes heavy tailed distributions, hits-based approaches, and how “EA superstars” can have much much more impact than the average EA. This can reinforce perfectionist tendencies like “I have to be great, otherwise I’m a failure”.
Also, making mistakes in EA can be very costly, as the stakes can be very high. Some of your mistakes really could lead (indirectly, counterfactually speaking) to many beings suffering or dying. It’s not like your mistakes might just cost you a promotion. This high cost of mistakes can also reinforce perfectionist tendencies.
Lastly, many EAs—including our past selves—tend to believe that we should indeed aim for the minimum of self-care necessary. These sentiments can lead those who are vulnerable to perfectionistic impact obsession to dismiss the negative consequences of overexerting themselves to reach their demanding standards.
Impact obsession, scrupulosity and OCD
Interestingly, impact obsession seems very related to moral scrupulosity (as briefly discussed in footnote 5). This excellent post by Holly Elmore makes several interesting observations on the relationship between scrupulosity and EA, and what risks to be aware of. Particularly noteworthy is the observation that scrupulosity is characterized by an “excessive sense of personal responsibility [...or] “hyper-responsibility” (in the context of OCD), or the dysfunctional attitude of omnipotence.” A heightened sense of responsibility is arguably another core characteristic of impact obsession. (See also the influential concept of “heroic responsibility”.)
Scrupulosity is usually seen as a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and clinical perfectionism also shares similarities with OCD (Egan et al., 2016, ch.3.; Limburg et al., 2017). Taken together, this suggests that impact obsession shares some characteristics with OCD (which is part of the reason for why we settled on the term ‘impact obsession’) and may benefit from similar treatment approaches, at least to some extent.
More on differences and similarities between impact obsession and perfectionism
Generally speaking, clinical perfectionism tends to be more like a personality trait that shows up in several domains of life. In contrast, many impact-obsessed EAs are not perfectionistic in other areas of life. Impact obsession seems more related to one’s values and overall meaning, whereas clinical perfectionism is usually motivated by the fear of not wanting to feel incompetent or worthless. (That being said, unhealthy impact obsession often is motivated by these fears as well!)
Typical clinical perfectionism is often accompanied by more severe cognitive biases like overgeneralizing, catastrophizing, all-or-nothing thinking, selective attention, and so on. These biases might appear among those with impact obsession but usually in much less pronounced and rigid form. Generally, the patients described in most CBT books on clinical perfectionism are often quite irrational, rigid, and inflexible. EAs might read these books and think “well, I’m certainly not like these people” and conclude that they don’t have anything like clinical perfectionism. This may be true but they might still benefit from working on their unhealthy impact obsessive tendencies. Preventing this failure mode is another reason for having written this post.
Why do some people develop (unhealthy) impact obsession?
Our sense is that those who think in highly systematic, low-decoupling, non-compartmentalizing ways are more likely to develop impact obsession. In a sense, impact obsession is a logical consequence of deeply internalizing ideas and relevant thought experiments like utilitarianism/consequentialism + impartiality, astronomical stakes, the drowning child, and so on.
Speculatively, people who crave some form of objective, cosmic meaning and purpose (but who cannot find it elsewhere because, e.g., they don’t believe in God) might also be more prone to developing unhealthy impact obsession.
Some other idiosyncratic traits seem more common among those with unhealthy impact obsession, such as being disgusted with hypocrisy and other human flaws (especially when reflecting on their evolutionary roots) and a strong desire to not be like this (cf. Hanson’s “smart sincere syndrome”), i.e., wanting to be a hero. Moral scrupulosity and other maladaptive schemas like “unrelenting standards”, “approval seeking”, seem also more common among those with unhealthy impact obsession.