This is the second time I’ve written an updated version of a previous post; this one has been redone from scratch. If you read this newsletter you’ve very likely already heard of effective altruism, or EA, the philosophy/community that’s concerned with performing charitable acts in a way that creates the most positive good for the most people. If not, here’s an
Good article. I think you can’t talk about EA, however, without mentioning the rationalist movement which underpins it, which starts with equally good if vague ideas (“we should try to be wrong less often,” has some really good methods for getting there, but has one terrible mistake: the belief that all rational people should eventually agree. Meaning that there is one right answer, and if no one can disprove it, then you have that right answer. Ironically, a framework to achieve intellectual humility has within it the seeds of creating the exact opposite.
I kind of wonder what would happen if all EA came with the failsafe of “if the answer I came up with is the answer that makes me most happy it’s wrong.” I feel like it’d be a better program.
“Yaaaay I get to work on AI, like I always wanted.” WRONG
“Yaaaaay I get to buy a castle.” WRONG
“Yaaaay let’s go to Mars!” WRONG
At least it seems to me that more of the EA types are realizing that utilitarianism leads to disaster, which is a good thing.
“On this Giving Tuesday I’d like to explain to you why effective altruism is bad” and then reasonably backing it up makes this the epitome of a Freddie post
I agree EA has gotten weird, but, at its heart, isn't EA basically just "evidence based philanthropy." Like in medicine, I agree that suggesting that we use evidence to determine what works seems obvious, but like in medicine, it is actually not that common.
The "branding" or "cult-like" aspects of EA are probably necessary to get a lot of people to donate, in the same way that "branding" and "cult-like" aspects of Taylor Swift enjoyment gets more people to pay ungodly amounts for her concerts.
People don't generally like giving away money and getting nothing in return. Churches used to be a good answer to "what do I get?" and a big part of that was "community." If EA doesn't have a brand, community, leadership figures, etc, then it doesn't work for that. To some extent it's doing the work of branding causes that aren't well branded. Direct cash transfers to Rwandans doesn't give you the same in-group-identifying-bumper-sticker as NPR, NRA, Harvard, etc., which puts it at a massive disadvantage without the positive auspices of EA.
This seems all seems fine. If people are going to get involved in a community, centering it on giving money away seems about as good as you can get, even if you're not on board with all the philosophy.
I think there's a lot in here that's accurate, but I do want to push back somewhat with an affirmative case for EA. I'm not really an EA, but I am the guy who says we should spend money on mosquito nets instead of public libraries (in fact, I'm THE GUY who said that in the comments section on the last EA post), and I'll have you know that I do NOT mutter about Roko's Basilisk or anything weird or longtermist.
You're right that to the extent EA is a philosophy, it's basically just utilitarianism, and I think utilitarianism is underrated. I'm writing this fast so admittedly this is a bit of a drive-by, but I think it's not a coincidence that Bentham was an abolitionist and advocate for women's rights, and Kant was a racist. That is, to the extent utilitarianism pushes people in a direction against the current climate, I think it tends to push people in the right direction.
As I indicated earlier, I'm much more interested in the mosquito nets than longtermism, so I'd be happy with a less weird EA that focuses more on the mundane. But the counterpoint to that is, if, for example, you are genuinely very concerned about AI alignment, you want to encourage more weirdos to get involved in studying AI safety, so you kind of want to be weird and quirky and draw in the right sort of people to get them on the project. To put it another way, my vision of EA is millions of people all tithing to Against Malaria Foundation or GiveWell without thinking too hard about what they're doing; another vision is having a few thousand people working on AI alignment rather than only a few hundred. I'm at least a little concerned about AI, so I can respect where the latter thing is coming from.
One of the things a struggle with is keeping individual acts of altruism separate from decisions made at a policy level. I know that me giving the schizophrenic guy who lives in a flop house around the corner from me a buck or two when I see him is not the most effective help for his situation. But it feels good for him and for me in the immediate moment. However, were I a policy maker, I think its hard not to approach ameliorating his and the other men he lives with the issues they face, without getting into some kind of utilitarian calculus. Where those lines are drawn I guess are not always clear to me.
The "Very Bad Wizards" podcast had some pretty cool discussions around this which I really liked including their critique of Utilitarianism. (https://verybadwizards.fireside.fm/135)
Thank you for this - I have been involved in the nonprofit world for most of my [approaching] 30 year career. I get so tired of people who bemoan the large number of nonprofits, as though it's wasteful for people to spend their money on tiny ones instead of pooling their money into bigger -presumptively more effective - ones. The bottom line is that people give to charities for a lot of different reasons that are usually personal to them [eg; their relative died of a disease] and often local. You're not going to convince them to just change their donations to be more effective. Even the rich people who are touting effective altruism are getting something out of it - see SBF, Elon Musk, and many others who make national headlines for their giving. If my friends want to donate to a local charity that takes veterans with PTSD fly-fishing because 1) they want to honor military service and take care of veterans; and 2) they grew up in Montana and want to preserve fly-fishing as a local tradition, or maybe love to do it themselves, then how is that a bad thing? How is that not effective, especially if there are 40,000 similarly small organizations that help veterans? That's an actual figure by the way. And I for one love the fact that there are enough people out there who honor our country and military service to create 40,000 ways to help veterans and families who may be struggling.
People act in what they perceive to be their own best interest. Mother Theresa enjoyed the endorphin hit from her good works. Firemen running into burning buildings do so because they dread returning to the firehouse knowing that they could have changed the outcome. They also may dread criticism and enjoy that Mother Theresa heroism endorphin hit, too. Those of us less selfless-appearing are all driven the same way. Once that inescapable reality is internalized, life and the behavior of others becomes more clear. All that remains to analyze is the extent to which others seek to influence or deceive us about any unspoken goals or hidden agendas behind the actions they take which, to restate, represent at the moment what they believe to be in their own best interest.
The whole EA thing is massively disappointing because there really are huge inefficiencies in the way charitable aid is allocated; I work in that sector and am always looking for ways to do it better. I share the conclusion that public health in the developing world is one of the most important things you can work on, and I work on that. At some point, it felt like the EA movement could be a good reaction to the inefficiencies of huge international NGOs that could steer resources in a better direction. Alas, not once when I've engaged with Effective Altruism as it exists has it given me any insights into how to do my work better, beyond the banal truths you cite – although you'd be shocked to see how hard it can be to implement those banal truths in the aid industry.
EA is ultimately just the prosperity gospel for tech bros, a convenient excuse to feel moral while making lots of money and doing the kind of work you want to do anyway. That's why it's so focused on longtermism and AI – that's what's cool, that's what's lucrative, science fiction is a favourite genre so thinking about that is fun. They get to be rich AI dudes while maintaining smugness over their peers. The story of someone insisting 'I can't do any good without power' and then being corrupted by the pursuit of power is as old as time. And a lot of the flaws in EA (and utilitarianism) stem from adherents' total inability to see _themselves_ as merely human as well. It's a real tragedy, and ridiculous to boot.
GiveWell and GiveDirectly are both useful guides to channeling money though.
Good article. This somewhat clarifies a question I had, given your previous article in which you said the problem with EA is so few people don't really want to be charitable and the problem with the Rationalism movement is so few people want to be irrational.
- You have an entire chapter in How Elites Ate The Social Justice Movement devoted to why nonprofits are ineffective altruism. Arguably the whole book is how altruism becomes ineffective. Clearly that's real.
- Your book The Cult Of Smart details how the education system doesn't educate. (IIRC, you may have also commented about how the health care system is oriented toward things other than providing health care.) Clearly that's real too.
- You've complained that your critics will say "but Freddie, nobody's saying that, and if they are, they're unimportant". Now you're saying nobody's saying altruism should be ineffective and if they are, they're unimportant.
It now appears your critique is actually not that nobody is against doing altruism ineffectively, but that nobody's explicitly arguing that we shouldn't care about altruism. (They just act like they think that?)
Perhaps more importantly (and in my view more more effectively), you point out the "sage on the stage" celebrity social-group, the bait-and-switch, and the tendency to get away from concrete material issues in front of our nose and into abstractions.
I know a lot of EA people and I think they're generally a good bunch, but I think they suffer from a sort of anti-humanism as described by Matthew Crawford - they are aware of the flaws in human cognition, but instead of saying "huh maybe those are a part of being human, and we can work together to overcome them" the takeaway is that we need a super- (or non-)human class of reasoners to make plans without the filthy, matter-bound constraints of human existence getting in the way.
But we are humans, not computers - sometimes our instincts are right, sometimes a disgust response isn't something to be overcome but a valuable signal about what is right and wrong, sometimes we think differently about those close to us than those we don't really know.
Acting like there will be a human world where those facets of humanity will be winnowed away is ahistorical and misunderstands us hairless apes. I think this is why so many are into transhumanism- they see existence as a curse of suffering to be overcome with technology, not a gift of limitless value to be appreciated, puzzled over, laughed at, and enjoyed.
I think utilitarianism can bring some great insights, but so often the EA "fermi estimates" are just motivated wish fulfilment that gives an answer in the ballpark they want. Utilitarianism is an interesting and useful lens through which to explore decision-making, but if it's not tempered by some kind of virtue ethics it's a recipe for big, bad ideas.
Effective altruists always make me think of a writing class I taught many years ago. We were discussing whether we give money to panhandlers, and every last student said they never did, because we should give our money to food pantries instead. I asked the students if any of them actually had ever given money to a food pantry, and--you guessed it--every single one said no.
My problem with effective altruism is that in order for it to actually work in the real world--in order for effective altruists to ignore the promptings of conscience and donate to strangers instead--its practitioners must be perfectly rational. They must be impervious to such base emotions as greed, pride, and plain old obliviousness. Most effective altruists purport to be rationalists, but if you've spent much time in rationalist communities online (I have) you will rapidly discover that the last thing they are is rational. (As just one example, a commenter on the Astral Codex Ten blog once said that to maximize human happiness, we should force all girls and women of childbearing age to give birth once a year until either they die or enter menopause: More people means more happiness, right? I wish I could say that this guy was joking, but he was serious about the merits of this plan.)
We have seen where this irrationality leads--to Sam Bankman-Fried's thievery, to other colossal wastes of money, to boondoggles such as cruelty-free insect farms, to building longtermism castles in the sky, to--as Freddie points out--buying actual castles. (I get that it's more cost-effective for effective altruists to own a building instead of renting, but have these people never heard of FaceTime and Zoom? Why not hold their meetings online so they can donate more money?). I also suspect that some effective altruists who earn-to-give wind up succumbing to the lure of wealth and keep the money too.
The truth is that our emotions are a better guide to being charitable than pure reason is. The vast majority of us are more easily moved to generosity by the plight of the person in our own neighborhood than we are by abstract principles. Or, as Tolstoy once said, "The most important time is now. The most important person is the one standing right in front of us. And the most important thing to do is to do good for that person. That is why we are here."
After reading a New Yorker piece about SBF and his parents I couldn't help but conclude that these EA types don't actually care about people as individuals. Sure, they care about People (and naturally see themselves as saviors of the People), but normal human emotions of affection, interest, involvement with other humans seem to be missing entirely. There's no attempt at genuine connection, and that is probably the most damning and dangerous thing about EA.
Freddie wrote: "Public commenters like Scott Alexander and Matt Yglesias have complained that the Bankman-Fried affair has resulted in an overly harsh backlash to EA. The question I would ask of them is, why not just keep the actual charitable stuff you like, and jettison all the nonsense that took effective altruism in that regrettable direction?"
I don't read Scott Alexander closely enough to talk about him, but Yglesias pretty much does exactly that. He donates a percentage of his revenue to GiveWell and talks about them and Give Directly all the time. He rarely talks about the other stuff and has been somewhat skeptical when he does.
I agree entirely with the Utilitarian Trojan Horse critique. The EA/internet rationalist crowd is 100% committed to moral realism, but doesn’t have any argument for it. And of course, it is completely at odds with the rest of their views. When they describe EA as:
> a research field, which aims to identify the world’s most pressing problems
they are starting with the assumptions ”there is no fact-value distinction” and ”we can have knowledge of values.”
It’s not so much a philosophy as a failure to understand what philosophy is.
Good article. I think you can’t talk about EA, however, without mentioning the rationalist movement which underpins it, which starts with equally good if vague ideas (“we should try to be wrong less often,” has some really good methods for getting there, but has one terrible mistake: the belief that all rational people should eventually agree. Meaning that there is one right answer, and if no one can disprove it, then you have that right answer. Ironically, a framework to achieve intellectual humility has within it the seeds of creating the exact opposite.
I kind of wonder what would happen if all EA came with the failsafe of “if the answer I came up with is the answer that makes me most happy it’s wrong.” I feel like it’d be a better program.
“Yaaaay I get to work on AI, like I always wanted.” WRONG
“Yaaaaay I get to buy a castle.” WRONG
“Yaaaay let’s go to Mars!” WRONG
At least it seems to me that more of the EA types are realizing that utilitarianism leads to disaster, which is a good thing.
“On this Giving Tuesday I’d like to explain to you why effective altruism is bad” and then reasonably backing it up makes this the epitome of a Freddie post
I agree EA has gotten weird, but, at its heart, isn't EA basically just "evidence based philanthropy." Like in medicine, I agree that suggesting that we use evidence to determine what works seems obvious, but like in medicine, it is actually not that common.
The "branding" or "cult-like" aspects of EA are probably necessary to get a lot of people to donate, in the same way that "branding" and "cult-like" aspects of Taylor Swift enjoyment gets more people to pay ungodly amounts for her concerts.
People don't generally like giving away money and getting nothing in return. Churches used to be a good answer to "what do I get?" and a big part of that was "community." If EA doesn't have a brand, community, leadership figures, etc, then it doesn't work for that. To some extent it's doing the work of branding causes that aren't well branded. Direct cash transfers to Rwandans doesn't give you the same in-group-identifying-bumper-sticker as NPR, NRA, Harvard, etc., which puts it at a massive disadvantage without the positive auspices of EA.
This seems all seems fine. If people are going to get involved in a community, centering it on giving money away seems about as good as you can get, even if you're not on board with all the philosophy.
I think there's a lot in here that's accurate, but I do want to push back somewhat with an affirmative case for EA. I'm not really an EA, but I am the guy who says we should spend money on mosquito nets instead of public libraries (in fact, I'm THE GUY who said that in the comments section on the last EA post), and I'll have you know that I do NOT mutter about Roko's Basilisk or anything weird or longtermist.
You're right that to the extent EA is a philosophy, it's basically just utilitarianism, and I think utilitarianism is underrated. I'm writing this fast so admittedly this is a bit of a drive-by, but I think it's not a coincidence that Bentham was an abolitionist and advocate for women's rights, and Kant was a racist. That is, to the extent utilitarianism pushes people in a direction against the current climate, I think it tends to push people in the right direction.
As I indicated earlier, I'm much more interested in the mosquito nets than longtermism, so I'd be happy with a less weird EA that focuses more on the mundane. But the counterpoint to that is, if, for example, you are genuinely very concerned about AI alignment, you want to encourage more weirdos to get involved in studying AI safety, so you kind of want to be weird and quirky and draw in the right sort of people to get them on the project. To put it another way, my vision of EA is millions of people all tithing to Against Malaria Foundation or GiveWell without thinking too hard about what they're doing; another vision is having a few thousand people working on AI alignment rather than only a few hundred. I'm at least a little concerned about AI, so I can respect where the latter thing is coming from.
One of the things a struggle with is keeping individual acts of altruism separate from decisions made at a policy level. I know that me giving the schizophrenic guy who lives in a flop house around the corner from me a buck or two when I see him is not the most effective help for his situation. But it feels good for him and for me in the immediate moment. However, were I a policy maker, I think its hard not to approach ameliorating his and the other men he lives with the issues they face, without getting into some kind of utilitarian calculus. Where those lines are drawn I guess are not always clear to me.
The "Very Bad Wizards" podcast had some pretty cool discussions around this which I really liked including their critique of Utilitarianism. (https://verybadwizards.fireside.fm/135)
Thank you for this - I have been involved in the nonprofit world for most of my [approaching] 30 year career. I get so tired of people who bemoan the large number of nonprofits, as though it's wasteful for people to spend their money on tiny ones instead of pooling their money into bigger -presumptively more effective - ones. The bottom line is that people give to charities for a lot of different reasons that are usually personal to them [eg; their relative died of a disease] and often local. You're not going to convince them to just change their donations to be more effective. Even the rich people who are touting effective altruism are getting something out of it - see SBF, Elon Musk, and many others who make national headlines for their giving. If my friends want to donate to a local charity that takes veterans with PTSD fly-fishing because 1) they want to honor military service and take care of veterans; and 2) they grew up in Montana and want to preserve fly-fishing as a local tradition, or maybe love to do it themselves, then how is that a bad thing? How is that not effective, especially if there are 40,000 similarly small organizations that help veterans? That's an actual figure by the way. And I for one love the fact that there are enough people out there who honor our country and military service to create 40,000 ways to help veterans and families who may be struggling.
People act in what they perceive to be their own best interest. Mother Theresa enjoyed the endorphin hit from her good works. Firemen running into burning buildings do so because they dread returning to the firehouse knowing that they could have changed the outcome. They also may dread criticism and enjoy that Mother Theresa heroism endorphin hit, too. Those of us less selfless-appearing are all driven the same way. Once that inescapable reality is internalized, life and the behavior of others becomes more clear. All that remains to analyze is the extent to which others seek to influence or deceive us about any unspoken goals or hidden agendas behind the actions they take which, to restate, represent at the moment what they believe to be in their own best interest.
The whole EA thing is massively disappointing because there really are huge inefficiencies in the way charitable aid is allocated; I work in that sector and am always looking for ways to do it better. I share the conclusion that public health in the developing world is one of the most important things you can work on, and I work on that. At some point, it felt like the EA movement could be a good reaction to the inefficiencies of huge international NGOs that could steer resources in a better direction. Alas, not once when I've engaged with Effective Altruism as it exists has it given me any insights into how to do my work better, beyond the banal truths you cite – although you'd be shocked to see how hard it can be to implement those banal truths in the aid industry.
EA is ultimately just the prosperity gospel for tech bros, a convenient excuse to feel moral while making lots of money and doing the kind of work you want to do anyway. That's why it's so focused on longtermism and AI – that's what's cool, that's what's lucrative, science fiction is a favourite genre so thinking about that is fun. They get to be rich AI dudes while maintaining smugness over their peers. The story of someone insisting 'I can't do any good without power' and then being corrupted by the pursuit of power is as old as time. And a lot of the flaws in EA (and utilitarianism) stem from adherents' total inability to see _themselves_ as merely human as well. It's a real tragedy, and ridiculous to boot.
GiveWell and GiveDirectly are both useful guides to channeling money though.
Good article. This somewhat clarifies a question I had, given your previous article in which you said the problem with EA is so few people don't really want to be charitable and the problem with the Rationalism movement is so few people want to be irrational.
- You have an entire chapter in How Elites Ate The Social Justice Movement devoted to why nonprofits are ineffective altruism. Arguably the whole book is how altruism becomes ineffective. Clearly that's real.
- Your book The Cult Of Smart details how the education system doesn't educate. (IIRC, you may have also commented about how the health care system is oriented toward things other than providing health care.) Clearly that's real too.
- You've complained that your critics will say "but Freddie, nobody's saying that, and if they are, they're unimportant". Now you're saying nobody's saying altruism should be ineffective and if they are, they're unimportant.
It now appears your critique is actually not that nobody is against doing altruism ineffectively, but that nobody's explicitly arguing that we shouldn't care about altruism. (They just act like they think that?)
Perhaps more importantly (and in my view more more effectively), you point out the "sage on the stage" celebrity social-group, the bait-and-switch, and the tendency to get away from concrete material issues in front of our nose and into abstractions.
I know a lot of EA people and I think they're generally a good bunch, but I think they suffer from a sort of anti-humanism as described by Matthew Crawford - they are aware of the flaws in human cognition, but instead of saying "huh maybe those are a part of being human, and we can work together to overcome them" the takeaway is that we need a super- (or non-)human class of reasoners to make plans without the filthy, matter-bound constraints of human existence getting in the way.
But we are humans, not computers - sometimes our instincts are right, sometimes a disgust response isn't something to be overcome but a valuable signal about what is right and wrong, sometimes we think differently about those close to us than those we don't really know.
Acting like there will be a human world where those facets of humanity will be winnowed away is ahistorical and misunderstands us hairless apes. I think this is why so many are into transhumanism- they see existence as a curse of suffering to be overcome with technology, not a gift of limitless value to be appreciated, puzzled over, laughed at, and enjoyed.
I think utilitarianism can bring some great insights, but so often the EA "fermi estimates" are just motivated wish fulfilment that gives an answer in the ballpark they want. Utilitarianism is an interesting and useful lens through which to explore decision-making, but if it's not tempered by some kind of virtue ethics it's a recipe for big, bad ideas.
Effective altruists always make me think of a writing class I taught many years ago. We were discussing whether we give money to panhandlers, and every last student said they never did, because we should give our money to food pantries instead. I asked the students if any of them actually had ever given money to a food pantry, and--you guessed it--every single one said no.
My problem with effective altruism is that in order for it to actually work in the real world--in order for effective altruists to ignore the promptings of conscience and donate to strangers instead--its practitioners must be perfectly rational. They must be impervious to such base emotions as greed, pride, and plain old obliviousness. Most effective altruists purport to be rationalists, but if you've spent much time in rationalist communities online (I have) you will rapidly discover that the last thing they are is rational. (As just one example, a commenter on the Astral Codex Ten blog once said that to maximize human happiness, we should force all girls and women of childbearing age to give birth once a year until either they die or enter menopause: More people means more happiness, right? I wish I could say that this guy was joking, but he was serious about the merits of this plan.)
We have seen where this irrationality leads--to Sam Bankman-Fried's thievery, to other colossal wastes of money, to boondoggles such as cruelty-free insect farms, to building longtermism castles in the sky, to--as Freddie points out--buying actual castles. (I get that it's more cost-effective for effective altruists to own a building instead of renting, but have these people never heard of FaceTime and Zoom? Why not hold their meetings online so they can donate more money?). I also suspect that some effective altruists who earn-to-give wind up succumbing to the lure of wealth and keep the money too.
The truth is that our emotions are a better guide to being charitable than pure reason is. The vast majority of us are more easily moved to generosity by the plight of the person in our own neighborhood than we are by abstract principles. Or, as Tolstoy once said, "The most important time is now. The most important person is the one standing right in front of us. And the most important thing to do is to do good for that person. That is why we are here."
After reading a New Yorker piece about SBF and his parents I couldn't help but conclude that these EA types don't actually care about people as individuals. Sure, they care about People (and naturally see themselves as saviors of the People), but normal human emotions of affection, interest, involvement with other humans seem to be missing entirely. There's no attempt at genuine connection, and that is probably the most damning and dangerous thing about EA.
Freddie wrote: "Public commenters like Scott Alexander and Matt Yglesias have complained that the Bankman-Fried affair has resulted in an overly harsh backlash to EA. The question I would ask of them is, why not just keep the actual charitable stuff you like, and jettison all the nonsense that took effective altruism in that regrettable direction?"
I don't read Scott Alexander closely enough to talk about him, but Yglesias pretty much does exactly that. He donates a percentage of his revenue to GiveWell and talks about them and Give Directly all the time. He rarely talks about the other stuff and has been somewhat skeptical when he does.
I agree entirely with the Utilitarian Trojan Horse critique. The EA/internet rationalist crowd is 100% committed to moral realism, but doesn’t have any argument for it. And of course, it is completely at odds with the rest of their views. When they describe EA as:
> a research field, which aims to identify the world’s most pressing problems
they are starting with the assumptions ”there is no fact-value distinction” and ”we can have knowledge of values.”
It’s not so much a philosophy as a failure to understand what philosophy is.
It's "Giving Tuesday" and all our incoming are requests for $$$. So, this was a great post on this day.
My donations are scholarships for people to become librarians.