I’m impressed how modern EAs manage to spin any cause into being supposedly EA.
There’s just no way that things like this are remotely as effective as say GiveWell causes (though it wouldn’t even meet a much lower bar) and it barely even has longtermist points for it that can make me see why there’s at least a chance it could be worth it.
EA’s whlole brand is massively diluted by all these causes and I don’t think they are remotely as effective as other places where your money can go, nor that they help the general message.
It’s like people get into EA, realize it’s a good idea but then want to participate in the community and not just donate so everyone tries to come up with new clearly ineffective (compared to alternatives) causes and spin them as EA.
The article mentions EA exactly twice. One is to quote the “80,000 hours” figure. The other is at the end, suggesting that EA organizations should consider adopting the sort of structure the article argues for.
Neither of these things claims, or implies, or even suggests, that shifting firms to a worker-cooperative model is an “EA” cause in the sense of being a more effective thing to do with money than, say, feeding starving poor people or preventing cheaply-preventable disease or (for those who favour such things) trying to increase the probability that some time in the future there are a billion trillion gazillion happy satisfied productive people.
(I don’t know whether Ben is correct about worker cooperatives being a better organizational structure in general. I don’t know whether EA organizations are similar enough to other businesses that this would indicate it’s a good structure for them. But if it is a good structure for them, they should consider using it even if persuading others to adopt it isn’t an efficient use of money.)
What else could the “as a cause” in “socialist firms as a cause area” possibly mean, except “as an EA cause”? The title wouldn’t make sense if it just meant “as a cause, but not as any particular kind of cause”, and the only particular type of cause being discussed is EA.
I also don’t think that “alleviating misery” in this context can mean anything other than “alleviating misery, because you are EAs and EAs want to get rid of misery”.
I agree that “cause” here means “thing people trying to improve the world might want to consider putting time, money and/or effort into”. I don’t think it means “thing that is likely to be better in good done per dollar used than GiveWell’s top recommendations”.
If I wanted to spend money on making more firms be co-ops, I don’t even know how I’d do it. It doesn’t look to me as if the goal of this post is to recommend spending money on making more firms be co-ops.
My reading of the “conclusions and policies” section of the post is than Ben is saying two things: 1. It would be nice if there were more co-ops. 2. EA organizations might want to consider co-op structures.
I don’t think #1 is intended to say ”… and therefore EAs should be sending their charitable donations to organizations lobbying for there to be more co-ops”; I think it’s just a wouldn’t-it-be-nice-if. I think #2 is intended to suggest something EAs might want to do, but if Ben’s right then doing it wouldn’t compete with other things they do but would help those things. (I have no strong opinion on whether Ben is, in fact, right about this.)
Now, to be clear, I am not Ben and I don’t speak for him. Maybe he did mean more than that; maybe he does think that people wanting to give to EA causes should be sending some of their money to organizations doing co-op advocacy or something of the sort. If so, I agree that that’s unlikely to be as effective in good-done-per-dollar than, say, antimalarial bednets.
So if he didn’t mean that, was ”… as a cause” a bad choice of phrasing, as Tenoke says? Not necessarily. I think the diagnosis at the end of Tenoke’s comment is probably right: people get into EA, want to do things as well as giving money, and come up with other things to do. But Tenoke evidently thinks that’s clearly bad; I don’t. Effort isn’t fungible in quite the way money is. If Ben is more excited by co-ops than by bednets, his donations should probably still go to bednets[1], but his time might be more effectively spent on co-ops because people are much more effective doing things they’re excited by. (And because no one is required to spend all their time on maximally-efficient charitable things.)
[1] I don’t mean necessarily literal bednets, of course; that’s shorthand for “plausibly near-maximally efficient charitable causes” and there’s plenty of scope for disagreement about what those are.
I’m not sure Tenoke’s wrong about “as a cause” being misleading here. I stand by what I originally said about those words not implying or suggesting that co-ops are most effective per dollar. But maybe using those words has funky subconscious effects similar to suggesting that, even if no one would claim that co-ops are most effective per dollar if asked explicitly, or maybe it attracts the eye of EAs in a way it doesn’t deserve to, or something. But Tenoke’s apparent indignation at those words seems way over the top to me.
My prior is that other things are less effective and you need evidence to show they are more effective not vice versa.
Not all EA’s are longtermists.
Of course. I’m saying it doesn’t even get to make that argument which can sometimes muddy the waters enough to make some odd-seeming causes look at least plausibly effective.
My prior is that other things are less effective and you need evidence to show they are more effective not vice versa.
Appeal to presuppositions always feels weird to me. A socialist could just as easily say ‘my priors say the opposite’. In any case, you made a claim of comparison, not me, why is the burden of proof suddenly on me?
Of course. I’m saying it doesn’t even get to make that argument which can sometimes muddy the waters enough to make some odd-seeming causes look at least plausibly effective.
I’m trying to explain the scientific literature on co-ops, not persuade you of some scam.
I’m impressed how modern EAs manage to spin any cause into being supposedly EA.
There’s just no way that things like this are remotely as effective as say GiveWell causes (though it wouldn’t even meet a much lower bar) and it barely even has longtermist points for it that can make me see why there’s at least a chance it could be worth it.
EA’s whlole brand is massively diluted by all these causes and I don’t think they are remotely as effective as other places where your money can go, nor that they help the general message.
It’s like people get into EA, realize it’s a good idea but then want to participate in the community and not just donate so everyone tries to come up with new clearly ineffective (compared to alternatives) causes and spin them as EA.
The article mentions EA exactly twice. One is to quote the “80,000 hours” figure. The other is at the end, suggesting that EA organizations should consider adopting the sort of structure the article argues for.
Neither of these things claims, or implies, or even suggests, that shifting firms to a worker-cooperative model is an “EA” cause in the sense of being a more effective thing to do with money than, say, feeding starving poor people or preventing cheaply-preventable disease or (for those who favour such things) trying to increase the probability that some time in the future there are a billion trillion gazillion happy satisfied productive people.
(I don’t know whether Ben is correct about worker cooperatives being a better organizational structure in general. I don’t know whether EA organizations are similar enough to other businesses that this would indicate it’s a good structure for them. But if it is a good structure for them, they should consider using it even if persuading others to adopt it isn’t an efficient use of money.)
What else could the “as a cause” in “socialist firms as a cause area” possibly mean, except “as an EA cause”? The title wouldn’t make sense if it just meant “as a cause, but not as any particular kind of cause”, and the only particular type of cause being discussed is EA.
I also don’t think that “alleviating misery” in this context can mean anything other than “alleviating misery, because you are EAs and EAs want to get rid of misery”.
I agree that “cause” here means “thing people trying to improve the world might want to consider putting time, money and/or effort into”. I don’t think it means “thing that is likely to be better in good done per dollar used than GiveWell’s top recommendations”.
If I wanted to spend money on making more firms be co-ops, I don’t even know how I’d do it. It doesn’t look to me as if the goal of this post is to recommend spending money on making more firms be co-ops.
My reading of the “conclusions and policies” section of the post is than Ben is saying two things: 1. It would be nice if there were more co-ops. 2. EA organizations might want to consider co-op structures.
I don’t think #1 is intended to say ”… and therefore EAs should be sending their charitable donations to organizations lobbying for there to be more co-ops”; I think it’s just a wouldn’t-it-be-nice-if. I think #2 is intended to suggest something EAs might want to do, but if Ben’s right then doing it wouldn’t compete with other things they do but would help those things. (I have no strong opinion on whether Ben is, in fact, right about this.)
Now, to be clear, I am not Ben and I don’t speak for him. Maybe he did mean more than that; maybe he does think that people wanting to give to EA causes should be sending some of their money to organizations doing co-op advocacy or something of the sort. If so, I agree that that’s unlikely to be as effective in good-done-per-dollar than, say, antimalarial bednets.
So if he didn’t mean that, was ”… as a cause” a bad choice of phrasing, as Tenoke says? Not necessarily. I think the diagnosis at the end of Tenoke’s comment is probably right: people get into EA, want to do things as well as giving money, and come up with other things to do. But Tenoke evidently thinks that’s clearly bad; I don’t. Effort isn’t fungible in quite the way money is. If Ben is more excited by co-ops than by bednets, his donations should probably still go to bednets[1], but his time might be more effectively spent on co-ops because people are much more effective doing things they’re excited by. (And because no one is required to spend all their time on maximally-efficient charitable things.)
[1] I don’t mean necessarily literal bednets, of course; that’s shorthand for “plausibly near-maximally efficient charitable causes” and there’s plenty of scope for disagreement about what those are.
I’m not sure Tenoke’s wrong about “as a cause” being misleading here. I stand by what I originally said about those words not implying or suggesting that co-ops are most effective per dollar. But maybe using those words has funky subconscious effects similar to suggesting that, even if no one would claim that co-ops are most effective per dollar if asked explicitly, or maybe it attracts the eye of EAs in a way it doesn’t deserve to, or something. But Tenoke’s apparent indignation at those words seems way over the top to me.
Do you have any evidence for this?
Not all EA’s are longtermists.
My prior is that other things are less effective and you need evidence to show they are more effective not vice versa.
Of course. I’m saying it doesn’t even get to make that argument which can sometimes muddy the waters enough to make some odd-seeming causes look at least plausibly effective.
Appeal to presuppositions always feels weird to me. A socialist could just as easily say ‘my priors say the opposite’. In any case, you made a claim of comparison, not me, why is the burden of proof suddenly on me?
I’m trying to explain the scientific literature on co-ops, not persuade you of some scam.