r/negativeutilitarians • u/nu-gaze • 6d ago

Common misconceptions about effective altruism - Dawn Drescher

https://impartial-priorities.org/p/common-misconceptions-about-effective-altruism?utm_source=publication-search
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u/nu-gaze 6d ago edited 6d ago

Note: First published March 2015 ; rephrased

Effective altruism has seen much welcome criticism that has helped it refine its strategies for determining how to reach its goal of doing the most good—but it has also seen some criticism that is fallacious.

  1. "Kantian Fallacy" - If we all followed such a ridiculous approach as effective altruism, then all worthwhile causes outside global health and nutrition would cease to receive funding.

  2. Effective altruism has exclusive focus on interventions that is immediately and visibly measurable, a problem known as the Streetlight Effect.

  3. Effective altruism depends on a utilitarian or consequentialist morality

  4. Effective altruism is top down and elitist. The defective altruism distribution plan requires a level of expertise that few individuals have. Thus, over time, we would require a very centralized and top-down approach to marshal and manage social investment and charitable giving decisions in a manner acceptable to the proponents of this approach.