The problem with effective altruism is that it is impossible to signal.
There is an easy way to have nonconfrontational conversations about vegetarianism. My vegetarianism comes up a lot! I can talk to a friend about recipes, or ask whether the restaurant has good vegetarian options, or visibly not be having any of the entree. Sometimes, this is really annoying. I am pretty sure every vegetarian or vegan has had the following conversation:
Omnivore: Why aren’t you eating the bacon?
Vegetarian: Well, I’m vegetarian.
Omnivore: Why are you vegetarian?
Vegetarian: (sighs, knows what’s coming) I’m opposed to factory farming.
Omnivore: Why are you opposed to factory farming?
Vegetarian: Well, they pack animals into spaces so tight that they can barely move, give them no access to the outdoors, and keep them from experiencing natural behaviors, which means that pretty much every animal in a factory farm is experiencing constant physical and mental torment.
Omnivore: GOD, why did you tell me THAT? Why can’t vegetarians ever SHUT UP about VEGETARIANISM? We’re trying to have DINNER here!
But, as annoying as that conversation is, it’s actually good how obvious it is when you’re a vegetarian. The thing is that people hate to be lectured about how terrible their life choices are. (Even when they’re asking for it. I have no idea what omnivores are expecting when they ask why one is opposed to factory farming.) It comes off to them like you’re saying that you’re awesome and they’re evil.
So instead I talk about how yummy Morningstar Farms chicken nuggets are and my favorite risotto recipe and that gives people the idea that vegetarianism is a normal thing done by normal people and not as hard as you think it is and that, in fact, you totally can still eat lots of delicious food. And as annoying as conversations about how factory farming is evil are, at least they are planting a seed that will hopefully blossom into a beautiful flower of not eating corpses.
Unfortunately, there’s basically no way to do this with EA. There’s no situation where effective altruism naturally comes up. Pretty much any situation where you can say “I donate ten percent of my income and you should too!” comes off as “you’re an asshole who doesn’t care about poor people and I am your moral superior,” which is really not a good look on anyone.
This is really bad, because I think people’s #1 response to “you should donate ten percent of your income to effective causes” is “gosh, that’s a lot of money! Can people actually do that? Would I be able to spend money on going to the movies? Would I have to live in a trailer?” So the fact that normal people with happy lives do effective altruism is actually really important.
There are some efforts to fix this with T-shirts, which is my favorite way of fixing everything. However, I think what we really need is a holiday.
Consider Stanislav Petrov Day. Every year, on Stanislav Petrov Day, my social media lights up with people talking about existential risk. (I’d like to particularly highlight this short story by Jai as one of my favorite contributions.) Admittedly, I have a self-selected and awesome group of friends, but I do think that there’s an advantage to having a Schelling point “day where we talk about how it is a bad idea to destroy the world.”
The best thing about Stanislav Petrov Day is that it isn’t even about MIRI. It’s about that guy who didn’t destroy the world. You can totally oppose MIRI and still support having a holiday to celebrate That Guy Who Didn’t Destroy The World That One Time. But it’s a day where you naturally have a conversation that naturally leads to discussing existential risk. That sort of indirection might be good for the holiday, in terms of popular appeal and not signalling virtue, but I suspect an EA holiday would be a good idea regardless.
This is the point where I ought to have a suggestion for what and when the Effective Altruist Holiday should be. Unfortunately, I don’t have a clue. Any good suggestions?
challquist said:
Norman Borlaug’s birthday?
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Nick said:
Peter Singer’s birthday was the first idea that came to my mind, although I’m not at all qualified to say which of the two would be better.
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ozymandias said:
I have personal objections to that because a number of my friends think of Mr. Singer as the Yay Murdering Disabled Babies guy.
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queenshulamit, the sad fat weird girl with incredible boobs said:
I agree with Ozy. I *never* mention Peter Singer when talking about EA because of this.
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Adelene said:
Ozy is a wise Ozy.
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Daniel Speyer said:
Borlaug is awesome, but I’d be inclined to celebrate his birthday around concepts more specific to what he did.
I propose February 5. It’s 10% of the way through the year. Also, it’s the sort of depressing-late-winter that we (northern hemispherers) could use a holiday in.
It’s close to Valentine’s Day. Maybe we could do something with that. Romantic love vs love for every thinking being…
We also want to do something highly visible. Putting candles in our windows isn’t very urban friendly. Maybe something clothing-based…
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Effective Differentials said:
I think this is an excellent idea. Historical events are commonplace to celebrate, so it doesn’t look to weird or preachy, yet it provides a natural opening to discuss EA.
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James Miller said:
When at a restaurant you could not leave a tip (or give a small one) and then when asked why give an EA compatible explanation.
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ozymandias said:
I suspect that is not necessarily going to help the “coming off as a smug, superior asshole” problem, particularly given that tipping poorly is generally considered a strong signal of jerkitude (c.f. “if they’re nice to you and not nice to the waiter, they’re not really nice”).
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Jai said:
Why would you do that? “I’m going to viscerally associate denying you things and people being mean to you with the idea of effective altruism. This is a good plan.”
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Jai said:
We were just talking about this at the last Seattle Effective Altruists meeting! So, one thing we are doing is hosting a Secular Solstice, which isn’t *overtly* about effective altruism but we’re probably going to talk about how far we’ve come in reducing suffering and how far we have to go and the virtue of helping others and most of the people present will be EA-types. So, that’s kind of something! At least it’s a big public event with the name and idea of effective altruism prominently attached.
We’re also trying to establish an in-group norm of bragging. When I announced that I had taken the Giving What We Can pledge, I got high fives! Woo! It’s still choir preaching, but it’s getting closer to bring able to talk about it publicly without being a jerk. Also, I’m totally bragging here. Look at me signal! I WILL SIGNAL MY VIRTUE THE BEST.
I post about charity and GiveWell once every few months; I don’t explicitly mention EA – I lead with “look at study linking charity to happiness, this is an extremely ethical way to buy happiness!” followed by “these are the best ways to convert money into world-improvement that I know of”. This seems to get mostly-positive results.
Also I’m happy you liked my Stanislav Petrov Day story. π
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A Cat in Ulthar said:
In addition to t-shirts, there’s also the option of buttons, jewelry, hats, etc. More EA merch would be great.
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Sonata Green said:
In the US and maybe elsewhere or maybe not, the Dubiously Secularized Winter Holiday Season often includes publicly collecting for various charities, which provides an existing opportunity to mention one’s favorite charity. Similarly, people sometimes say things like “in place of giving me [money for doing cool stuff / flowers because someone close to me died / etc.], please donate to [specified charity]”.
Basically, look for places where there are existing norms allowing people to promote their favorite charities, and use those.
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leopoldtal said:
Helen Toner of Melbourne threw a sort of party where she baked cookies and people could eat as many as they wanted in exchange for giving $10. That was great fun and we should do more things like that. Of course most people there were already effective altruists, so I’m not sure how to increase recruitment faster than them bringing their friends.
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Dread Lord von Kalifornen said:
How about an altar of some form?
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raemon777 said:
Hmm.
At first I was going to note that the Solstice is (sort of) an EA holiday, but it doesnβt serve the specific purpose youβre talking about here and Iβd (tentatively) say that it probably shouldnβt.
Youβre really talking about a βgiving 10% to effective charity holidayβ, as opposed to an βEA Holiday.β (If Petrov Day doesnβt count as an EA holiday already, itβs because weβre already breaking EA into its component parts. I *do* think this is useful, so that different ideas get highlighted)
Considerations:
1) Something to consider is βAwareness Dayβ vs βHolidayβ. A Holiday attempts to have an actual culture. An Awareness Dayβ¦ maybe sort of does but not really.
Holidays are more fun and probably have more sticking power. Awareness days look less weird (which is also why they probably have less sticking power)
2) It should absolutely be in December, when people are most likely to think about giving anyway
I did like the β10% of the way through the yearβ aspect of the βFebruaryβ date, so maybe 10% of the way through December? (Dec 3rd?)
3) An βAwareness Dayβ can be more effective if itβs got something fun to do (think βIce Bucket Challengeβ) that our monkey brains care about.
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David Speyer said:
June 25th, six months opposite Christmas. Donations to most charities are needed year-round but peak at Christmas, with another comparable peak at Thanksgiving. Putting the holiday on June 25th will lead to donations when they are most needed, which is a very Effective thing to do.
Obviously, the most effective way to donate is not to peak at any time of the year but to commit to a regular monthly donation, so the charity can plan their finances around it. And charities which work with the homeless in the northern temperate regions really do have higher expenses in the winter, so the peak isn’t completely irrational. Nonetheless, there is a summer gap, and a holiday on June 25th leads naturally to a conversation about thinking about when and where your money will do the most good.
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Daniel Speyer said:
Should have figured I’d run into you here eventually π
I can see the summer thing, but I’d oppose linking directly to Christmas. It has a sort of “Christianity is the one real religion and we’re the little side-group related to it” vibe that I’d rather avoid.
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jamiekmg365 said:
Sounds like a very similar idea to TZM’s “The First Christmas”:
http://blog.thezeitgeistmovement.com/blog/jimshock/first-christmas
Nothing says altruism like “don’t spend your money on me–I’ve already got too many possessions that just weigh me down–give it to someone who really could use it.” Do it in my name, if it makes you feel better/less weird about it, since if you really wanted to “give” me something for Christmakwanzakah that you think I’d like, this would be it. π
Imagine turning the nightmare of “Black Friday” into the transformative: “(some other color, or none at all, but certainly nothing to do with trying feebly to prop up the cancerous market economy that caused the need for this much ‘charity’ in the first place) Friday”.
While I really like the Petrov Day idea (and the 10% of the year/month ideas), the sooner we decouple the solution to this “need for charity” from throwing more money at it, to maybe trying to not continually create more of it, the better off we all and the planet will be in the end.
If not on Black Friday (for easy free publicity!), I also like the solstice as a time slot, (and you could do it at both of them to catch both hemispheres), because it’s global/universal, completely objective, observable, and easily defensible as a choice.
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William_S said:
I would suggest a date related to the eradication of smallpox.
Why?
It represents a moderately salient threat (disease).
It represents a complete victory over the threat in question.
It represents international coordination and teamwork.
It links to developing world health interventions, which currently seem to be the EA “gateway”.
It’s uncontroversial.
Some possible dates:
There are the dates where resolutions WHA11.54 and WHA12.54 passed (looks like June 12 (1958) and May 29 (1959), not 100% sure) (resolution text http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/88784/1/WHA11.54_eng.pdf?ua=1 and http://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/88847/1/WHA12.54_eng.pdf)
The wikipedia article( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox) lists December 9 (1979) as the date that smallpox was certified as eradicated, and 8 May (1980) when the WHO passed a resolution recognizing eradication (WHA33.3)
Gordon Irlam has made the case for Viktor Zhdanov as the most important person in smallpox eradication
(https://80000hours.org/2012/02/in-praise-of-viktor-zhdanov/) His birthday was February 13 (1914), but I’d prefer something less tied to one person
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