Non-EA interests include chess and TikTok (@benthamite). We are probably hiring: https://www.centreforeffectivealtruism.org/careers
Ben_West
Karma: 13,541
Moderator Appreciation Thread
Some Comments on the Recent FTX TIME Article
Announcing CEA’s Interim Managing Director
Debate series: should we push for a pause on the development of AI?
Third Wave Effective Altruism
Lab-grown meat is cleared for sale in the United States
Rates of Criminality Amongst Giving Pledge Signatories
Zach Robinson will be CEA’s next CEO
EU Food Agency Recommends Banning Cages
EA Strategy Fortnight (June 12-24)
Why CEA Online doesn’t outsource more work to non-EA freelancers
Comparative advantage does not mean doing the thing you’re best at
Entrepreneurship ETG Might Be Better Than 80k Thought
First FDA Cultured Meat Safety Approval
Leaked EU Draft Proposes Substantial Animal Welfare Improvements
Still, it’s hard to see how tweaking EA can lead to a product that we and others be excited about growing. Especially considering that we have the excellent option of just talking directly about the issues that matter to us, and doing field-building around those ideas… This would be a relatively clean slate, allowing us to do more (as outlined in 11), to discourage RB, and stop bad actors.
Do you remember how animal rights was pre-EA? The first Animal Rights National Conference I went to, Ingrid Newkirk dedicated her keynote address to criticizing scope sensitivity, and arguing that animal rights activists should not focus on tactics which help more animals. And my understanding is that EA deserves a lot of the credit for removing and preventing bad actors in the animal rights space (e.g. by making funding conditional on organizations following certain HR practices).
It’s useful to identify ways to improve EA, but we have to be honest that imaginary alternatives largely seem better because they are imaginary, and actual realistic alternatives also have lots of flaws.
(Of course, it’s possible that those flawed alternatives are still better than EA, but figuring this out requires actually comparing EA to those alternatives. Some people have started to do this e.g. here, and I find that work valuable.)
EA Communication Project Ideas
Thoughts on being overqualified for EA positions
Super sorry to see you go Max. It’s honestly kind of hard to believe how different CEA is today from when I joined, and a lot of that is due to your leadership. CEA has a bunch of projects going on, and the fact that you can step down without these projects being jeopardized is a strong endorsement of the team you’ve built here.
I look forward to continuing to work with you in an advisory role!
Hey everyone, on an admin note I want to announce that I’m stepping in as “Transition Coordinator.” Basically, Max wanted to step down immediately, and choosing an ED even on an interim basis might take a bit, so I will be doing the minimal set of ED-like tasks to keep CEA running and start an ED search.
If things go well you shouldn’t even notice that I’m here, but you can reach me at ben.west@centreforeffectivealtruism.org if you would like to contact me personally.