Are you familiar with Effective Altruism or EA? Those who are familiar with SBF or Sam Bankman-Fried and Michael Lewis’s book Going Infinite know they infiltrated Silicon Valley long ago. Read the slippery, noncommittal definition of EA from effectivealtruism.org below:
Effective altruism isn’t defined by the projects above, and what it focuses on could easily change. What defines effective altruism are the principles that underpin its search for the best ways of helping others:
Prioritization: Our intuitions about doing good don’t usually take into account the scale of the outcomes — helping 100 people often makes us feel as satisfied as helping 1000. But since some ways of doing good also achieve dramatically more than others, it’s vital to attempt to use numbers to roughly weigh how much different actions help. The goal is to find the best ways to help, rather than just working to make any difference at all.
Impartial altruism: It’s normal and reasonable to have special concern for one’s own family, friends or nation. But, when trying to do as much good as possible, we aim to give everyone’s interests equal weight, no matter where or when they live. This means focusing on the groups who are most neglected, which usually means focusing on those who don’t have as much power to protect their own interests.
Open truthseeking: Rather than starting with a commitment to a certain cause, community or approach, it’s important to consider many different ways to help and seek to find the best ones. This means putting serious time into deliberation and reflection on one’s beliefs, being constantly open and curious for new evidence and arguments, and being ready to change one’s views quite radically.
Collaborative spirit: It’s often possible to achieve more by working together, and doing this effectively requires high standards of honesty, integrity, and compassion. Effective altruism does not mean supporting ‘ends justify the means’ reasoning, but rather is about being a good citizen, while ambitiously working toward a better world.
These principles are not absolutes, and are subject to revision, but we think they’re important and undervalued by society at large. Anyone applying these principles in trying to find better ways to help others is participating in effective altruism. This is true no matter how much time or money they want to give, or which issue they choose to focus on.
Effective altruism can be compared to the scientific method. Science is the use of evidence and reason in search of truth – even if the results are unintuitive or run counter to tradition. Effective altruism is the use of evidence and reason in search of the best ways of doing good.
The scientific method is based on simple ideas (e.g. that you should test your beliefs) but it leads to a radically different picture of the world (e.g. quantum mechanics). Likewise, effective altruism is based on simple ideas – that we should treat people equally and it’s better to help more people than fewer – but it leads to an unconventional and ever-evolving picture of doing good.
Read through those descriptions and you get:
- Nothing absolute
- No commitment to ideals
- You’re probably wrong
- Ever-evolving
- Unintuitive
- Counter to tradition
Action Line: Do these sound like descriptions of something that will be effective? Not to Your Survival Guy. If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything. Click here to subscribe to my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter. You know what you’re fighting for it’s you, your family, and the future. I know you’re serious, and I’m fighting alongside you.
