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I agree with much of this article. I looked at the twitter output of an acquaintance a couple of days back and after literally 60 seconds I felt my mind becomin

by tomgp 6y ago

I agree with much of this article. I looked at the twitter output of an acquaintance a couple of days back and after literally 60 seconds I felt my mind becoming a stew of frustraion and anxiety -- i agreed with many of the points and retweets and slogans but to what end? On the other hand I'm dubious of effective altruism as a model for improving the world it seems to me it has very little chance of creating necessary structural change. Charitable giving is great but why as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists -- often gross benneficiaries exisiting power structures.

chordalkeyboard 6y ago
> Charitable giving is great but why as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists -- often gross benneficiaries exisiting power structures. This is an interesting framing. What form of social organization would make it so that altruistic behavior was not a result of the whims of people in extant power structures? It seems tautologous that if someone has the power to allocate funds, they are the current beneficiary of the extant power structure.
fennecfoxen 6y ago
> why as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists Well, what do the alternatives look like? It's not like powerful politicians aren't self-aggrandizing; I'm sure many of them would like to effect structural change, but the structural change they want is probably pretty suspect. Nor is it the case that "political majorities", writ large, have an untarnished reputation for gentleness and decency.
kubanczyk 6y ago
> as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists As a society we can be changed by individual people. I would prefer to retain that, yes.
pixl97 6y ago
I dont really believe the altruism model will work myself, at least with our current society and the power memes have over people. CGP Grey's, This video will make you angry really gives a lot of insight into the nearly biological nature of memes and the selection process that goes into the ones that we end up seeing. https://youtu.be/rE3j_RHkqJc https://youtu.be/rE3j_RHkqJc

by tomgp 6y ago

chordalkeyboard 6y ago

> Charitable giving is great but why as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists -- often gross benneficiaries exisiting power structures. This is an interesting framing. What form of social organization would make it so that altruistic behavior was not a result of the whims of people in extant power structures? It seems tautologous that if someone has the power to allocate funds, they are the current beneficiary of the extant power structure.

fennecfoxen 6y ago

> why as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists Well, what do the alternatives look like? It's not like powerful politicians aren't self-aggrandizing; I'm sure many of them would like to effect structural change, but the structural change they want is probably pretty suspect. Nor is it the case that "political majorities", writ large, have an untarnished reputation for gentleness and decency.

kubanczyk 6y ago

> as a society should we be subject to the whims of individual philanthropists As a society we can be changed by individual people. I would prefer to retain that, yes.

pixl97 6y ago

I dont really believe the altruism model will work myself, at least with our current society and the power memes have over people. CGP Grey's, This video will make you angry really gives a lot of insight into the nearly biological nature of memes and the selection process that goes into the ones that we end up seeing. https://youtu.be/rE3j_RHkqJc https://youtu.be/rE3j_RHkqJc