Before his arrest this week in the killing of UnitedHealthcare’s CEO, Mangione’s family desperately tried to find him, reaching out to former classmates and posting queries on social media.
Effective altruisim is fine on paper, and I’m sure there’s people effectively effective altruisim, but most people who champion it are…well…Sam Bankman-Fried and friends. Wearing a mask of doing it for the unfortunate and spending everything on a beachfront mansion robbing Peter to pay Paul, with absolutely no real intention of helping the folk that “effective” altruisim is meant to help.
I liked Luigi, and this is gonna sound a bit rough, because he shot a useless piece of shit drain on society. Effective altruisim is nice on paper, but it’s almost always used to fleece the stupid so the rich can get richer.
large sections of lemmy have convinced themselves that Luigi is a leftist before learning that he’s an EA libertarian and all implications and what side effects followed cause brain damage
He’s young. He’s still working out his view of the world. Of course he’s gonna investigate ideas, accepting some and rejecting others. He’s not far off.
I’m not suggesting which ideas are right and wrong, or which he would accept or reject.
I’m saying he’s young and seeking out ideas. Of course some will be problematic. He might reject them. He might not. Regardless, just the fact that he was curious is a point in his favor.
I’m much older than him and this is the first time I’ve heard of “effective altruism.”
I wasn’t criticizing stoicism or effective altruism because I’m not informed enough on them. I wasn’t criticizing rationalism because I’m in favor of it. But I’m willing to bet if society has managed to fuck up stoicism and altruism, we’ve probably done the same with rationalism too.
I wasn’t addressing which ideas or positions he was taking because I can’t see inside his head. I have no idea how he thinks, or which paths he has taken. I don’t know how he will change in the future. That would be presumptuous.
I do like that he is curious. That’s a good quality in a person. Not everyone is.
I literally just said that this is the first time I’ve heard of effective altruism. I read what others said about it here, and it doesn’t sound good. I have generally favored what little I’ve read about stoicism, but apparently it’s become problematic too. I know better than to talk about ideas that I’m unfamiliar with. Is it a problem that I refuse to assert any kind of intellectual authority where I have none?
So what I said was I appreciate the fact that he is curious. I remember when I was his age. I believed in some batshit crazy things. I was a devout fundamentalist christian, a young earth creationist, an incel before they used the word. You know how I broke free of all that? Insatiable curiosity. I filled my head with other people’s ideas. Cognitive dissonance forced me to abandon bad ideas and I clung to good ideas until I was able to form a solid foundation for how to face reality. Rationality was critical to that process.
I’m not prepared to criticize the ideas and positions he was curious about. But I do praise a curious mind. Young people are still forming their positions. Part of that process is investigating ideas, accepting the good and rejecting the bad. I don’t know how he will turn out. But curiosity is a good quality.
okay a lot of that is good and all, but here’s the flipside: a lot of these fuckwits outright prey on naïve curiousity. it is one of their biggest feeders for taking in people who don’t yet know any better
and that’s kinda the point. broadly I agree with you, but curiousity is a dangerous things
(also the reason I asked was the framing of one of your statements, so: Rationalism, big-R specifically. congratulations on learning about some of the worst people around)
I went to a university with a big Effective Altruist presence (I think I still have a ruler and a memory stick with their branding on it somewhere) and I found many of the arguments they make quite compelling until I looked into the movement more deeply and saw its repugnant core
Many people who are drawn to Effective Altruism are aware of the state of the world, and their relative privilege, but they feel overwhelmed by how little they’re able to contribute to solving problems, relative to the size of the problems. People don’t “donate” to EA, they’re buying into a lie that helps them to feel less directly responsible for the world.
Effective altruisim is fine on paper, and I’m sure there’s people effectively effective altruisim, but most people who champion it are…well…Sam Bankman-Fried and friends. Wearing a mask of doing it for the unfortunate and spending everything on a beachfront mansion robbing Peter to pay Paul, with absolutely no real intention of helping the folk that “effective” altruisim is meant to help.
I liked Luigi, and this is gonna sound a bit rough, because he shot a useless piece of shit drain on society. Effective altruisim is nice on paper, but it’s almost always used to fleece the stupid so the rich can get richer.
I would say that he has some moral principles and did actually effective altruism
CEOs vs dust specks (large ones very fast)
large sections of lemmy have convinced themselves that Luigi is a leftist before learning that he’s an EA libertarian and all implications and what side effects followed cause brain damage
Getting flashbacks to the people who thought the GameStop guy was a leftist
https://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/1go1ndu/rsuperstonk_in_the_midst_of_a_political_civil_war/
ah yeah the famously leftist activity: stock trading
difference here is that superstonk is qanon-grade conspiracy by now and here it’s luigi who adheres to tpot schizopolitics
He’s young. He’s still working out his view of the world. Of course he’s gonna investigate ideas, accepting some and rejecting others. He’s not far off.
“Which ideas?”
“Oh, you know the ones”
I’m not suggesting which ideas are right and wrong, or which he would accept or reject.
I’m saying he’s young and seeking out ideas. Of course some will be problematic. He might reject them. He might not. Regardless, just the fact that he was curious is a point in his favor.
I’m much older than him and this is the first time I’ve heard of “effective altruism.”
you: thinks one is doing this with care and finesse
nobody:
everyone else: 🤨
I wasn’t criticizing stoicism or effective altruism because I’m not informed enough on them. I wasn’t criticizing rationalism because I’m in favor of it. But I’m willing to bet if society has managed to fuck up stoicism and altruism, we’ve probably done the same with rationalism too.
I wasn’t addressing which ideas or positions he was taking because I can’t see inside his head. I have no idea how he thinks, or which paths he has taken. I don’t know how he will change in the future. That would be presumptuous.
I do like that he is curious. That’s a good quality in a person. Not everyone is.
I… have to ask: are you actually aware of what the hell the context is of the things that you’re commenting about?
I literally just said that this is the first time I’ve heard of effective altruism. I read what others said about it here, and it doesn’t sound good. I have generally favored what little I’ve read about stoicism, but apparently it’s become problematic too. I know better than to talk about ideas that I’m unfamiliar with. Is it a problem that I refuse to assert any kind of intellectual authority where I have none?
So what I said was I appreciate the fact that he is curious. I remember when I was his age. I believed in some batshit crazy things. I was a devout fundamentalist christian, a young earth creationist, an incel before they used the word. You know how I broke free of all that? Insatiable curiosity. I filled my head with other people’s ideas. Cognitive dissonance forced me to abandon bad ideas and I clung to good ideas until I was able to form a solid foundation for how to face reality. Rationality was critical to that process.
I’m not prepared to criticize the ideas and positions he was curious about. But I do praise a curious mind. Young people are still forming their positions. Part of that process is investigating ideas, accepting the good and rejecting the bad. I don’t know how he will turn out. But curiosity is a good quality.
okay a lot of that is good and all, but here’s the flipside: a lot of these fuckwits outright prey on naïve curiousity. it is one of their biggest feeders for taking in people who don’t yet know any better
and that’s kinda the point. broadly I agree with you, but curiousity is a dangerous things
(also the reason I asked was the framing of one of your statements, so: Rationalism, big-R specifically. congratulations on learning about some of the worst people around)
I went to a university with a big Effective Altruist presence (I think I still have a ruler and a memory stick with their branding on it somewhere) and I found many of the arguments they make quite compelling until I looked into the movement more deeply and saw its repugnant core
Many people who are drawn to Effective Altruism are aware of the state of the world, and their relative privilege, but they feel overwhelmed by how little they’re able to contribute to solving problems, relative to the size of the problems. People don’t “donate” to EA, they’re buying into a lie that helps them to feel less directly responsible for the world.
oh yeah, lotta EAs really care and work their backsides off and live on beans
it’s a pity about the ones at the top