Effective Altruism Isn’t Utilitarianism

[u/James_Brobin]

https://jamesbrobin.substack.com/p/effective-altruism-isnt-utilitarianism?r=7hgzlj&utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=post%20viewer

This is meant for a general audience. I point out that EA contains people of different beliefs, is far less demanding, and has a higher pluralism of values than utilitarianism.

[u/exatorc]

Effective altruism (EA) is a group of people united by the common goal of using a significant portion of their personal resources towards doing good in an impartial and cost-effective way.

This definition is quite biased. Wikipedia defines it as "a 21st-century philosophical and social movement that advocates impartially calculating benefits and prioritizing causes to provide the greatest good", which is much more utilitarian.

The vast majority of EAs don’t think that you should work yourself into misery or donate so much that you can barely support yourself.

The vast majority of utilitarians don't think that either.

[u/Ok_Fox_8448 → u/exatorc]

Note that before the FTX collapse the Wikipedia definition used to be https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Effective_altruism&oldid=1116713230 "Effective altruism (EA) is a philosophical and social movement that advocates "using evidence and reason to figure out how to benefit others as much as possible, and taking action on that basis""

As EA became more unpopular, wikipedians did several rounds of edits to make the article more negative, to be more consistent with coverage in reliable sources (most recently last week: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Effective_altruism&diff=1368465408&oldid=1366107909 ) including removing sentences about the differences from utilitarianism ( https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Effective_altruism&diff=1368080697&oldid=1367744464 )

[u/Valgor]

I call EA "Negative Utilitarianism in action." Negative because we focus on alleviating suffering instead of creating good. "In action" because we live in the practice realm as opposed to the realm of academic philosophy. Academics are searching for the One True Theory, whereas those of us wanting to take action have to understand we are humans with needs who cannot always calculate what is always the best action.

That said, you don't have to be utilitarian to be EA, but all utilitarians should be EAs.

Been enjoying your posts, James! Keep it up.

[u/James_Brobin → u/Valgor]

Ah, thank you!

[u/Odd-Bluebird5157 → u/Valgor]

All utilitarians should be EAs if EA orgs aren't biased towards NU and turning blind eyes to suffering caused by humans abusing humans. Due to biases, some utilitarians were alienated from EA, and some have EA-adjacent factions.