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‘Eugenics on steroids’: the toxic and contested legacy of Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 6 months ago by return2ozma@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

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[–] otter@lemmy.ca 17 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (3 children)

rise to cultish ideas such as effective altruism

I hadn't heard of any controversies around EA, it always seemed like a positive thing.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism

So what I'm getting is that the philosophies aren't the problem, but rather it's members of the community doing unethical things in the name of the movement

Sam Bankman-Fried
Bay Area Misogyny

In a 2023 Time magazine article, seven women reported misconduct and controversy in the effective altruism movement. They accused men within the movement, typically in the Bay Area, of using their power to groom younger women for polyamorous sexual relationships.[147] The accusers argued that the majority male demographic and the polyamorous subculture combined to create an environment where sexual misconduct was tolerated, excused or rationalized away.

Still bad and needs calling out

[–] driving_crooner@lemmy.eco.br 29 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) (3 children)

Philosophy Tube have a great video about Effective Altruism. It was some time ago that I watched, but iirc, EA is just "let us do unregulated capitalism at our own benefit, because in the future trillions and trillions of humans are going to benefit from it. Don't mind the planet being destroyed now, and the billions of humans suffering now, everything would be cool in future. Trust me bro."

[–] MysticKetchup@lemmy.world 8 points 6 months ago

God they just rebranded trickle-down-economics

[–] PipedLinkBot@feddit.rocks 3 points 6 months ago

Here is an alternative Piped link(s):

Philosophy Tube

Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

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[–] SmoothOperator@lemmy.world -1 points 6 months ago

That's only "longtermism". EA as introduced by Peter Singer in "the life you can save" is an incredibly sincere and well founded philosophy of charity.

[–] cmbabul@lemmy.world 21 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The EA movement, based on what I know of it, seems as though it’s complete hogwash, just a veneer of ‘mathematically proven’ benevolence hiding privileged people who are really only endeavoring to further enrich themselves. It looks and smells like bullshit to me. I’m sure some good things have been done by people who call themselves EAs but it’s still really reminiscent to trickle down economics from my perspective

Check out the original episodes Behind the Bastards did on Bankman-Fried for a more in depth and entertaining breakdown of why they suck

[–] otter@lemmy.ca 11 points 6 months ago

I must have had a very surface level understanding of what it was. The parts I saw previously were about finding which charities to donate to and career development.

I've got more to read about for sure

[–] RobotToaster@mander.xyz 5 points 6 months ago

Sam Bankman-Fried

To be fair they seem to admit that promoting him as a positive example was a mistake.

https://80000hours.org/articles/earning-to-give/#doing-harm