The Most Interesting People I Know
News:Politics
[This episode was recorded before the FTX collapse. It contains some discussion of Sam Bankman-Fried. Habiba has asked me to pass on that, to say the least, she no longer endorses what she says about Sam as an example of someone doing good. I've also linked in the show notes to her twitter thread with her thoughts on FTX.]
This episode is a long time in the making. We’re going deep on the intersection of effective altruism (EA) and the left.
When I tell people that I’m a leftist and into effective altruism, they’re often surprised. A lot of the recent criticism of EA from the left may make it seem like the ideas and communities are incompatible, causing people to genuinely ask, can you be an effective altruist and a leftist? I think you can. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t real tensions between the two approaches to improving the world.
This is not meant to be a point by point rebuttal of any criticisms of EA or the left. Instead, I wanted to better understand myself how these ideas interact.
To discuss this, I brought on Habiba Islam. Habiba is a career advisor for 80,000 Hours, an organization that helps people find high-impact careers. 80,000 Hours grew out of the effective altruism movement, but Habiba also identifies as a leftist. As you’ll soon discover, Habiba has given these ideas a lot of thought and helped clarify a lot of longstanding confusions for me.
We go through our backgrounds with the left and EA and attempt to define each. We then go through hidden agreements EA and the left have, misconceptions each has about the other, and the real disagreements between EA in practice and the left.
When I first got into EA and left politics, I had grand plans to try to reconcile the two. I felt like EA’s commitment to prioritization, responding to evidence, and doing whatever works could help make the left better at achieving its goals. And I thought that the left’s ability to build movements, shape narratives, analyze power, and understand history could shore up some major blindspots within EA. Time has tempered my ambitions a bit, and I think there are good reasons why the left and EA will and should remain distinct things. But there is still a lot each can learn from the other.
Left critiques of EA:
Show notes:
34 - Carl Robichaud on Oppenheimer and Dealing with Nukes
32 - Rutger Bregman on Why People Are Decent, Effective Altruism, and Causing Tucker Carlson’s Meltdown
31 - Alexander Zaitchik on How Bill Gates Impeded Global Access to Covid Vaccines
30 - Tobias Leenaert on the Pragmatic Path to a Vegan World
29 - Conor Oberst on Bright Eyes, the Iraq War, protest music, and the music industry under socialism
28 - David Shor on Why Bernie Would Have Won in 2016- But Not in 2020
27 -Trevor Beaulieu on Champagne Sharks and Why Killmonger Was Right
26 - Ross Barkan on Running for Office and the Return of Socialism to New York
25 - Charlie Bresler on the Lives You Can Save
24 - Edgar Villanueva on Decolonizing Wealth
23 - Akash Mehta on why Andrew Cuomo is Not Your Friend
22 - Zach Roberts on Bloomberg's NYPD and Antifascist Journalism
21 - Malaika Jabali on Identity Politics and Myths About the Midwest
20 - Meagan Day on the Case for Bernie Sanders
19 - Ben Burgis on Reclaiming Logic for the Left
18 - Marcus Davis on Nuclear War, Invertebrate Sentience, and Foundational Research
17 - Rob Scott on Teaching College in Prison
16 - Andrés Gómez Emilsson on Solving Consciousness and Being Happy All the Time
15 - Matt Stoller on Fighting Monopoly Power and Why Obama Was Actually Bad
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