Resources to check out

Notes

The argument for working on EA

• Linked page lays out the case compellingly:
• multiplier effect: see more here, with the slightly nuanced lens of "being a multiplier"
• Keeps your options open if the ideas of EA turn out to be wrong (note that I think that this is also a reason to be careful on working on EA)
• Neglected

The argument not to (also from Duda 2017)

• The ideas of EA are correct, or will be badly implemented (likely to be the the community fails to put the ideas of EA into practice)
• depends on how much you trust the EA community
• depends on your model of how the EA community works (see Linked page)
• There is a specific problem that is much more pressing
• depends on how significant you think longtermism is
• There is a better opportunity for advocacy
• depends on how sure you are that a given cause area is the best one
• There is a better way to gain flexibility
• depends on how much you think
• gaining career capital early in career (e.g. by working in a non-EA aligned company) is valuable
• working on other directly EA internventions gives you flexibility
• Widespread promotion of the current ideas of effective altruism may be premature (ideas will change)
• how much will ideas change?

What sub-tracks are there within working on EA?

• Being a public intellectual
• Being involved in operations
• see Linked page
• Running an EA group
• Being involved in some large EA non-profit
• Promoting EA on the side
• Earn to give to EA orgs

Cause Prioritization considerations

• What causes is this cause more important than?
• I think that there is a strong case to be made, that this is the most important cause area. This argument goes something like
• Most of the expected value of EA as a movement is in the future, as EA ideas mature
• Thus, being a community builder who reduces X risk to EA is v high impact because even reducing EA X risk by 0.01% increases expected value a lot
• What causes could be more important that this?
• From a high level cause cause comparison perspective, other causes would be more important if you think that X risk to EA is low, or that you aren't able to provide much benefit
• From a personal career perspective, you might think that other causes give more career flexibility or are just higher impact
• How does this interact with other causes?
• Highly interrelated with other causes in the sense that:
• Many causes are either
• totally under the umbrella of EA (e.g longtermism)
• Partly under the umbrella of EA (e.g AI safety, global poverty)
• This suggests that if EA has some extinction event (loosely defined as everyone hates EA) then this has a huge impact on these causes
• Also interrelated on a day to day basis
• community builders likely interact with people in different cause areas, help them make professional/social connections, etc.

What this cause area most needs

• This is hard to say, but in general:
• Talent (rather than money)
• Expertise in operations
• People who can think about failure modes of EA
• People who can reach out to others and build connections

Other notes