Executive summary: This personal yet extensively researched critique argues that the Effective Altruism (EA) movement suffers from deep structural and ideological flaws—primarily a lack of governance, overreliance on utilitarian principles, and epistemic fragility—that undermine its ability to achieve its stated goals; the author calls for serious reform from the movement’s central organizations and leaders.
Key points:
EA’s ideology, heavily shaped by utilitarianism, encourages harmful norms such as quantifying moral impact at the cost of human relationships and well-being, maximizing good to the point of burnout, and placing excessive moral burdens on individuals.
The community’s informal governance has enabled concentration of power—particularly within Open Philanthropy and CEA—without corresponding accountability structures, allowing poor decisions and scandals (e.g., FTX) to go unchecked.
Epistemic weaknesses, including deference-based information cascades and the illusion of openness to criticism, distort truth-seeking and limit the community’s ability to self-correct or benefit from outside perspectives.
Attempts at reform—like the EV board overhaul and governance improvements—are promising but insufficient, as the movement still lacks clear mechanisms to define responsibility, shape ideology democratically, or balance power.
The author proposes specific structural reforms, including establishing formal responsibilities for central organizations, defining an official ideology, implementing epistemic quality controls, and increasing transparency.
Despite the harsh critique, the tone is reformist rather than hostile, and the author emphasizes continued hope, care for the community, and a shared commitment to “doing good better.”
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, and contact us if you have feedback.
Executive summary: This personal yet extensively researched critique argues that the Effective Altruism (EA) movement suffers from deep structural and ideological flaws—primarily a lack of governance, overreliance on utilitarian principles, and epistemic fragility—that undermine its ability to achieve its stated goals; the author calls for serious reform from the movement’s central organizations and leaders.
Key points:
EA’s ideology, heavily shaped by utilitarianism, encourages harmful norms such as quantifying moral impact at the cost of human relationships and well-being, maximizing good to the point of burnout, and placing excessive moral burdens on individuals.
The community’s informal governance has enabled concentration of power—particularly within Open Philanthropy and CEA—without corresponding accountability structures, allowing poor decisions and scandals (e.g., FTX) to go unchecked.
Epistemic weaknesses, including deference-based information cascades and the illusion of openness to criticism, distort truth-seeking and limit the community’s ability to self-correct or benefit from outside perspectives.
Attempts at reform—like the EV board overhaul and governance improvements—are promising but insufficient, as the movement still lacks clear mechanisms to define responsibility, shape ideology democratically, or balance power.
The author proposes specific structural reforms, including establishing formal responsibilities for central organizations, defining an official ideology, implementing epistemic quality controls, and increasing transparency.
Despite the harsh critique, the tone is reformist rather than hostile, and the author emphasizes continued hope, care for the community, and a shared commitment to “doing good better.”
This comment was auto-generated by the EA Forum Team. Feel free to point out issues with this summary by replying to the comment, and contact us if you have feedback.