What with new books on effective altruism out this year, The Most Good You Can Do, by Peter Singer; How to Be Great at Doing Good, by Nick Cooney; and Doing Good Better, by William MacAskill, there is a plethora of new material to mine for sound-bites or excerpts explaining effective altruism. Additionally, with Effective Altruism Global, and so many new organizations and blogs producing great content, there is an abundance of inspiring information to cite. Thus, I'm reviving the effective altruism quotes thread.
Here's a massive compilation of 170+ EA-relatable quotes I've been gathering for a couple months now (useful for, e.g. social media, writing).
Feel free to add new quotes and categories, make suggestions or link to other quote compilation threads/documents!
Well, that's it, everyone else go home! Matiss wins! Seriously, that's quite impressive. When I have time to brose through it later today or tomorrow I'll pull out what I think are some of the best quotes and post them in this thread on their own if I think they deserve special attention. Feel free to do this yourself, of course, so I don't hog all the karam points ;)
Here is a qoute to an important, awkward, and sometimes neglected question in effective altruism. I think Peter Singer answers it sufficiently and succinctly.
These quotes are a bit more general, but I find them deeply inspiring: https://www.givingwhatwecan.org/get-involved/charity-quotations
"Not any more." - Fake GiveWell quote
http://i.imgur.com/wuH7JkV.jpg -Holden and Elie
This made my day. Did you make this? This is amazing.
My suggestion for Givewell's new slogan*: Charity for the Charity God! Evaluation for the Evaluation Throne!
*not really
Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
Robert Wiblin, executive director, Centre for Effective Altruism; research director, 80,000 Hours
"Whenever in the course of my life I have come across, in convents for instance, truly saintly embodiments of practical charity, they have generally had the cheerful, practical, brusque and unemotioned air of a busy surgeon, the sort of face in which one can discern no commiseration, no tenderness at the sight of suffering humanity, no fear of hurting it, the impassive, unsympathetic, sublime face of true goodness." ~ Marcel Proust
-- William MacAskill, Doing Good Better
Has anyone else finished Nick Cooney's book? I thought it was excellent, like his others. I'd recommend it as something to give people new to EA.
I haven't read it yet. However, I've only ever encountered praise for Nick Cooney's writing. At first I was surprised, because he focuses on helping animals, and doesn't necessarily specialize in psychology. Alas, he seems to be a bona fide altruism Renaissance man! I'll buy or borrow his new book as soon as I get the chance, on your recommendation.
I'm looking forward to reading it even more than the ones from Dr. Singer or Dr. MacAskill, as a fresh perspective would be pretty cool.
Someone should do a review of it, for instance on the EA Forum
Selected quotes from Scott Alexander's essay Stop Adding Zeroes
On what it means to be an effective altruist:
This comment on how the whole point of 80,000 Hours' recommendations apply to considerations of marginal* impact, but with appropriate caveats included:
-- William MacAskill, Doing Good Better