Hi, I’m Jess. I’m currently living in Oxford and doing a PhD in Behavioural Science—I’m looking at ways of making people more willing to consider evidence that conflicts with their existing views, and more likely to change their minds about important topics. I want to figure out how people can be more open-minded and truth-seeking, basically :)
I got involved in effective altruism after I finished my degree at Oxford, and came across 80,000 Hours. I’d always wanted to make a difference in the world, but was feeling a bit disillusioned about how to do it and unsure how this really fitted with my skills and interests. I ended up spending a year working for 80k—mostly designing and running the careers advising process—whilst learning more about effective altruism and thinking about what to do with my life. I’m still figuring a lot of this out!
I blog at www.jesswhittlestone.com and have written a number of EA-related posts for the 80,000 Hours blog.
Nice post, Peter!
Asides from seeming boastful, I think the other risk of talking publicly about giving is that it can risk seeming critical, or alienating people. I’ve definitely found some people respond to me talking about giving defensively—if I say I donate x%, they might look for reasons why I’m being unreasonable, or why my situation is very different from theirs. I think this is because they feel threatened—talking about giving can make some people feel like you are judging them for not giving, which provokes a defensive reaction.
Of course, in a lot of cases it may be that this risk is outweighed by the benefit of making giving seem more commonplace. And the more people talk about giving, the more of a “social proof” effect you get, and so the less likely this is to be an issue. But I think it’s something worth bearing in mind, especially in one-on-one interactions.