I don’t believe that this conventional wisdom is wrong. Clearly both past movements and our EA movement have been fueled by such superhuman efforts.
But these movements would have died out if they only allowed superhuman actors. This is a bit of a strawman, but I’m trying to illustrate a point: I know most of us EAs are not superhuman. I know the less efficient of us are considered part of the movement and are not excised by the superhumans. But when I read through old facebook threads on EA, I again and again see a public norm established as needing to be superhuman.
I’m not saying we should abolish superhuman acts, nor that they should be more quiet about it; instead, I’m claiming that when the public face of EA only shows such people, it does EA a disservice. Yes, the superhumans should still do superhuman stuff and dominate the headlines about EA. But when people come to places like this forum or the main EA facebook group, they need to see that other effective altruists are just like them in as many respects as is possible, so that there is as little inferential distance between them-in-the-now and them-as-a-future-EA as we can manage. The more inferential distance, the less likely they are to join EA.
I don’t believe that this conventional wisdom is wrong. Clearly both past movements and our EA movement have been fueled by such superhuman efforts.
But these movements would have died out if they only allowed superhuman actors. This is a bit of a strawman, but I’m trying to illustrate a point: I know most of us EAs are not superhuman. I know the less efficient of us are considered part of the movement and are not excised by the superhumans. But when I read through old facebook threads on EA, I again and again see a public norm established as needing to be superhuman.
I’m not saying we should abolish superhuman acts, nor that they should be more quiet about it; instead, I’m claiming that when the public face of EA only shows such people, it does EA a disservice. Yes, the superhumans should still do superhuman stuff and dominate the headlines about EA. But when people come to places like this forum or the main EA facebook group, they need to see that other effective altruists are just like them in as many respects as is possible, so that there is as little inferential distance between them-in-the-now and them-as-a-future-EA as we can manage. The more inferential distance, the less likely they are to join EA.