Thanks for adding more here :) I think that evidence is more persuasive, though still reads a little vibe-y and data-free, and involves reading intention into some actions that might not be there.
As I said, those bullet points were a memory of a draft so I don’t have the hard data to share on hand. But when dealing with social movements it’s always going to be somewhat vibesy—data will necessarily be observational and we can’t travel back in time and run RCTs on whether SBF commits fraud or not. And the case studies do show that declines can go on for a very long time post major crisis. It’s rare for movements to disappear overnight (The Levellers come closest of all the cases I found to that)
Fwiw I think that the general evidence does point to “EA is in decline” broadly understood, and that should be considered the null hypothesis at this point. I’d feel pretty gaslit if someone said EA was going swimmingly and unaffected by the tribulations of the last couple of years, perhaps less so if they think there’s been a bounce back after an initial decline but, you know, I’d want to see the data for that.
But as I said, it’s really not the (main) point of the post! I’d love to add my points to a post where someone did try and do a deep dive into that question.
I’d feel pretty gaslit if someone said EA was going swimmingly and unaffected by the tribulations of the last couple of years, perhaps less so if they think there’s been a bounce back after an initial decline but, you know, I’d want to see the data for that.
Thanks for adding more here :) I think that evidence is more persuasive, though still reads a little vibe-y and data-free, and involves reading intention into some actions that might not be there.
No worries Ollie, thanks for the feedback :)
As I said, those bullet points were a memory of a draft so I don’t have the hard data to share on hand. But when dealing with social movements it’s always going to be somewhat vibesy—data will necessarily be observational and we can’t travel back in time and run RCTs on whether SBF commits fraud or not. And the case studies do show that declines can go on for a very long time post major crisis. It’s rare for movements to disappear overnight (The Levellers come closest of all the cases I found to that)
Fwiw I think that the general evidence does point to “EA is in decline” broadly understood, and that should be considered the null hypothesis at this point. I’d feel pretty gaslit if someone said EA was going swimmingly and unaffected by the tribulations of the last couple of years, perhaps less so if they think there’s been a bounce back after an initial decline but, you know, I’d want to see the data for that.
But as I said, it’s really not the (main) point of the post! I’d love to add my points to a post where someone did try and do a deep dive into that question.
I can’t seem to find it now, but I think someone calculated that funding to EA was higher in 2023 and 2024 than any year except 2022.
I agree with this fwiw, that seems fair