Clarifying this a bit more (from seeing the comments):
I assume that people close to this decision have reasons why they think this makes sense for OP, as a way to maximize OP’s contributions at some level.
This might well be for reasons like: 1. This could be a good experiment in OP collaborating with other philanthropists. 2. This could be a good way for OP to gain recognition by other important parties. 3. Maybe Dustin Moskovitz really wants this, and this is a way for other OP leaders to come to some agreement where they get more clearly-efficient funding for something else. 4. Maybe OP could learn other useful things by doing this that will lead to wins in other areas. 5. Maybe this is a cause area that does well if one uses some weighted average of different philanthropic views.
I don’t have a problem with OP doing this, and don’t mean to claim they’re not trying to maximize impact in some way.
At the same time, 1. I think that we (i.e. effective altruist enthusiasts reading public information) just don’t know how they justify this internally. I wouldn’t be surprised if we never find out. As others have flagged, it’s likely that revealing the true reasons might make their work less effective. 2. Again, there’s an important question of what EAs should take away from this. And I imagine we shouldn’t assume that “This is generally an effective cause area for other regular EA funding and talent, outside of OP.” It seems likely that a lot of the benefit here is fairly specific to the strategy and interests of people at OP. 3. There’s one related topic of “Is there any delineation in what projects EAs might consider EA/effective/interesting?” The more causes are justified on grounds that aren’t clear and transparent, the messier this gets. Lots of other philanthropists and leaders also do major things that aren’t directly effective, but that they think will ultimately be best for the world. 4. While I’m sure it’s the case they have some reasons they think this makes sense, I think it’s reasonable for onlookers to be skeptical that it’s actually worth it. To me, this venture rhymes a lot with the common mistake that many organizations make of over-extending themselves. I personally am probably more worried about the managerial attention they may spend on this than the $60m. 5. If one goes all the way on the idea that “private reasons make it likely that this is a good move, so we shouldn’t try to evaluate it from the outside,” one might assume that “All kinds of public critique of all organizations are invalid, because all organizations might have secretive information that makes their decisions unusually justified.” I think that public critique and evaluation is still important to attempt. I also think that OP is one of the most important groups to understand and critique, just because of it’s outsized impact around EA.
Other miscellaneous points: 1. Obviously, I find it interesting that this fairly-short press release has led to so much theorizing on our end. (perhaps me in-particular, as I’ve written a lot of the comments) 2. I think it’s kind of telling that OP hasn’t paid many people to directly engage with the EA Forum or other EA discussion. For example, I wouldn’t expect that it’s anyone’s job to respond to comments in these threads. This is almost ironic given that they pay for the CEA team, including the EA Forum team. But I think that they consider open communication about these topics, from OP team members, to be highly costly, and I correspondingly don’t expect them to provide much more insight on this or similar topics to our community. If I were to put myself in their shoes, I think they have a lot of worries about what other potential large donors, political actors, and other specific groups think about them. And they’re less concerned about the EA community. One thing this means is that PR statements like this won’t generally provide much information that the EA community in particular would care about.
Clarifying this a bit more (from seeing the comments):
I assume that people close to this decision have reasons why they think this makes sense for OP, as a way to maximize OP’s contributions at some level.
This might well be for reasons like:
1. This could be a good experiment in OP collaborating with other philanthropists.
2. This could be a good way for OP to gain recognition by other important parties.
3. Maybe Dustin Moskovitz really wants this, and this is a way for other OP leaders to come to some agreement where they get more clearly-efficient funding for something else.
4. Maybe OP could learn other useful things by doing this that will lead to wins in other areas.
5. Maybe this is a cause area that does well if one uses some weighted average of different philanthropic views.
I don’t have a problem with OP doing this, and don’t mean to claim they’re not trying to maximize impact in some way.
At the same time,
1. I think that we (i.e. effective altruist enthusiasts reading public information) just don’t know how they justify this internally. I wouldn’t be surprised if we never find out. As others have flagged, it’s likely that revealing the true reasons might make their work less effective.
2. Again, there’s an important question of what EAs should take away from this. And I imagine we shouldn’t assume that “This is generally an effective cause area for other regular EA funding and talent, outside of OP.” It seems likely that a lot of the benefit here is fairly specific to the strategy and interests of people at OP.
3. There’s one related topic of “Is there any delineation in what projects EAs might consider EA/effective/interesting?” The more causes are justified on grounds that aren’t clear and transparent, the messier this gets. Lots of other philanthropists and leaders also do major things that aren’t directly effective, but that they think will ultimately be best for the world.
4. While I’m sure it’s the case they have some reasons they think this makes sense, I think it’s reasonable for onlookers to be skeptical that it’s actually worth it. To me, this venture rhymes a lot with the common mistake that many organizations make of over-extending themselves. I personally am probably more worried about the managerial attention they may spend on this than the $60m.
5. If one goes all the way on the idea that “private reasons make it likely that this is a good move, so we shouldn’t try to evaluate it from the outside,” one might assume that “All kinds of public critique of all organizations are invalid, because all organizations might have secretive information that makes their decisions unusually justified.” I think that public critique and evaluation is still important to attempt. I also think that OP is one of the most important groups to understand and critique, just because of it’s outsized impact around EA.
Other miscellaneous points:
1. Obviously, I find it interesting that this fairly-short press release has led to so much theorizing on our end. (perhaps me in-particular, as I’ve written a lot of the comments)
2. I think it’s kind of telling that OP hasn’t paid many people to directly engage with the EA Forum or other EA discussion. For example, I wouldn’t expect that it’s anyone’s job to respond to comments in these threads. This is almost ironic given that they pay for the CEA team, including the EA Forum team. But I think that they consider open communication about these topics, from OP team members, to be highly costly, and I correspondingly don’t expect them to provide much more insight on this or similar topics to our community. If I were to put myself in their shoes, I think they have a lot of worries about what other potential large donors, political actors, and other specific groups think about them. And they’re less concerned about the EA community. One thing this means is that PR statements like this won’t generally provide much information that the EA community in particular would care about.