Optimize Your Giving
CrowdSource 12.16.2024
Welcome to CrowdSource, your weekly guided tour of the latest intellectual disputes, ideological disagreements, and national debates that piqued our interest (or inflamed our passions). This week: effective altruism and its critics.
Join us! CrowdSource features the best comments from The Crowd — our cherished readers and subscribers who, with their comments and emails, help make Wisdom of Crowds what it is.
Effective Altruism in the News
Last week, the New York Times published an article profiling leading philanthropists who have turned against the ethical theory known as “Effective Altruism,” or EA.
EA is based on Utilitarianism, the philosophical school which argues that “the only effects of actions that are relevant are the good and bad results that they produce” (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy).
Principles. The principles of EA were set by philosopher Peter Singer in a 1972 article, “Famine, Affluence and Morality”: “if it is in our power to prevent something very bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything morally significant, we ought, morally, to do it.”
Obligations. Singer makes this example: “If I am walking past a shallow pond and see a child drowning in it, I ought to wade in and pull the child out.” Singer argues that this same principle applies globally: if we — those of us living in the affluent West — learn about a humanitarian disaster in, say, Bangladesh, we have an obligation to do what we can to help.
Optimize Your Giving. Many Silicon Valley leaders have taken Singer’s principles to the next step: optimization. As the Times reports, “… the Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and his wife, Cari Tuna[’s] … approach to charity argues, essentially, that you do not get to feel good for having done anything at all. People should give wherever their money is most needed and most likely to yield the biggest effects.”
Was it Immoral to Fix Notre Dame Cathedral?
Also last week, the Notre Dame Cathedral of Paris was reopened, after 5 years of restoration work in the wake of a 2019 fire. $760 million were spent to restore the building. EA advocates have questioned the morality of spending money on the medieval monument, as opposed to other humanitarian initiatives.
“How Many Lives is Notre Dame Worth?” In 2019, a month after the burning of Notre Dame, Peter Singer wrote an article which argued (from EA principles) that money should not be spent on restoring the cathedral, but instead on helping the poor of the developing world.
The “Elemental Truth” of EA. In support of Singer and EA (and responding to the Times piece), Dylan Matthews writes: “ ‘We should let children die to rebuild a cathedral’ is not a principle anyone should be willing to accept.”
What Money Can’t Buy. It was precisely this argument that turned journalist Amy Schiller into a critic of EA. As the Times reports: “ ‘[Peter Singer’s] asking the wrong question,’ [Schiller] recalled thinking at the time. She wanted to know: How could anyone put a numerical value on a holy space?’.” Last year Schiller published a book exploring alternatives to EA for philanthropy.
The Power of French Cathedrals. For a non-Utilitarian evaluation of medieval monuments, consult the great travelogue, Mont St. Michel and Chartres, by American writer Henry Adams.
Arguments Against EA
The Times article is part of a growing intellectual reaction against EA.
Entering the fray over the past week, venture capitalist Marc Andreesen posted several critiques of EA, taking aim at its Utilitarian foundations:
Collectivism. EA is collectivist:“Utilitarianism ruthlessly subordinates individual rights to a tyrannical calculus of collective welfare.”
State of Exception. A critique based on the thought of Giorgio Agamben: “Agamben shows how utilitarian logic can be used to justify the suspension of normal legal and ethical frameworks in the name of maximizing welfare.” (Read about Giorgio Agamben here.)
“Effective Altruism is a Short Circuit.” Last year, friend of Wisdom of Crowds
wrote an essay critical of EA.
From the Crowd
Optimization and toxic positivity guide many programs on socialization. Don’t get me wrong, kindness and joy are essential parts of life. But so too, as Kimbriel notes, are the painful affects of life. True connection bonds and supports through both. This piece notes the importance that rituals of grief, etc can play here. And I think we forsake those elements of spiritual traditions to our detriment. Epistemological research shows that all social connection is good, but connection derived through religious affiliations offers an added benefit (ie greater effect size than just club memberships). I don’t think this has anything to do with theological beliefs, but rather as a marker that these social connections also take place in the context of rituals that have connected people through millennia as they faced life’s challenges.
Renowned socialist critic,
on ’s comment in a recent podcast: “it is difficult to betray one’s ideals if one doesn’t have any to begin with.” George responds:
A clever formulation, Shadi, but wrong. America has not betrayed its ideals. In its foreign policy, America has no ideals. America has, however, constantly betrayed its professed ideals. America claims to be desirous of promoting democracy and human rights. In fact it has intervened dozens of times in the politics of developing (and sometimes developed) countries, never to further democracy or human rights, invariably to promote a business-friendly climate or geostrategic advantage.
“Aha!” you will say. “What about American support for Eastern European or Cuban or Venezuelan or Iranian dissidents against their oppressors? Doesn't that prove our love for democracy?” No, it does not. The oppressors in all those cases are anti-capitalist; either they deny the US business opportunities or geopolitical advantage or pose the ideological threat of a good example (as Cuba might have, if it had been left alone, as many US policymakers have testified). If the US had ever made a sacrifice -- given up economic or military advantage in order to support a democratic movement against a business-friendly tyrant -- then it might make sense to speak of American ideals. I can't think of a single case, but even if I could, it would be outweighed by the many, many examples of invidious interventions. …
See you next week!
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There’s good points on both sides of the EA debate. And I think people of good faith can disagree on them. But there is also something of a solution, if you’re willing to split the difference. EA is driven by deliberation and attempts to override the quick and dirty rules our brains evolved to use to determine whose suffering is worthy of compassion. It’s emotions like compassion that usually drive giving, and so if they’re not part of the picture (as they often aren’t welling up in EA deliberations), it takes some of the warm glow out of giving. Recognizing this, Giving Multiplier (developed by psychologists Joshua Greene and Lucius Caviola) is a platform that allows you to do both. I’d urge interested WOC readers to check it out at givingmultiplier.org.
" ‘[Peter Singer’s] asking the wrong question,’ [Schiller] recalled thinking at the time. She wanted to know: How could anyone put a numerical value on a holy space?’"
I think Schiller's asking the wrong question. $750 million would save (let's say) 10,000 poor children's lives. So far, no value statements, just plain fact. At that point, anyone, Catholic or utilitarian, who has an opinion, one way or the other, about how to spend that money, has put a numerical value on a holy space.
One more silly, shallow criticism of Singer. They are legion.