Sure is comfy* how every other Kurzgesagt video is sponsored by an effective altruism organisation

*not comfy

[Open Phillantrophys] main funders are Cari Tuna and Dustin Moskovitz. Dustin says that their wealth, worth $11 billion, is "pooled up around us right now, but it belongs to the world. We intend not to have much when we die

Imagine having 11 billion buckaroos and spending money on showing me ads to convince me into giving you more money.

@rune

Hello there! (The Effective Altriusm Defender has logged on).

Could I know which video this is?

A priori this seems unlikely, I'd expect them to ask to donate to the organisations they support.

But then again, maybe it'd be good to think on the object level about what concrete things they are asking to be supported.

@niplav i don't think it merits debunking that it's peak cynicism to have 11 billion and then spend a bit of asking others to help while you still have 11 billion.

Effective altruism is full of disgustingly rich people who will try to guilt poor people into thinking they should be doing more while the same rich people do relatively nothing.

I can't think of a better example than the giving pledge. Started in 2010:

As of August 2010, the aggregate wealth of the first 40 pledgers was $125 billion.

Today Bill Gates is, according to Forbes, worth 117 billion. That's right, 13 years into his pledge Bill is now almost worth as much as the combined value of the initial 40 disgustingly rich people in 2010. I should start giving away my money, it seems super profitable.

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@rune
Here's some things I believe:

1. If you're in the top 5% of income worldwide (which would correspond to ~200k DKK/year) my ethics tells me that you have a pretty strong duty to give some of your income to the less fortunate. This duty rises with higher levels of wealth.

2. EA does usually *not* make this demand, and everyone who claims otherwise is kindly asked to provide strong evidence.

3. The people who have pledged to give away their fortunes will indeed do so.

@rune (And not just use it for money laundering).

4. Giving away all your money immediately is *not* the optimal way to make the world better. It would be pretty stupid to do that.

5. 11 billion dollars is *not* sufficient to solve even one global problem. And there are many of those: global poverty, climate change, factory farming, global catastrophic biorisk…

@rune

6. Neither is ~125 bio., although the case is less clear here—but the Giving Pledge doesn't say anything about how that money is supposed to be used, and indeed I believe it's going to be used for mostly stupid stuff. I don't consider the Giving Pledge to be an effective altruist institution, because the lack of constraints on effectiveness.

@rune

I will also give away some of my income, because I believe these things! It'll be ~10%, since i don't have 11 bio. (or 125 bio. dollars)

@niplav Yeah, we're not gonna agree on much given that I fundamentally reject the notion that 125 billion entitles you to "optimally" and "sufficiently" solve problems on your own. Meanwhile, people on 200k DKK, which I btw consider to be an extremely low bar for well off In Denmark, just have to give their money away because they aren't entitled to a say in things.

Why are rich people entitled to make these decisions? They're not even qualified. Also, no one asked for them to give up anything immediately. It's been one and a half decades. They care neither for the environment nor for the fundamental way they undermine everyone's well being by being leeches on society.

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