This post is related to the EACH research agenda item 6.1 “Are there differences between different forms of Christianity in how compatible they are with EA?”
Summary
Current Christian Representation in EA
- Majority of Christians in EA are Protestants
- Range from (moderate) conservative evangelical to liberal
- Roman Catholics present but possibly underrepresented
- Orthodox Christians notably rare
- General UK and US demographics likely explain a lot of this
The most conservative Christians are absent
- The most conservative (fundamentalist) Christians are noticeably absent
- Political and cultural differences with EA
- Tendency to separate from non-Christians
- Distrust of scientific establishment
- Differences in epistemological approach
Cultural, ethical, and doctrinal challenges for engagemetn
- EA or specifically EA for Christians may be perceived as Protestant by some non-Protestant Christians
- EA's consequentialist approach may challenge virtue ethics-oriented Christians
- Impartiality may conflict with specific moral obligations in some Christian traditions
- Eschatological beliefs may conflict with longtermism
- Views on human-animal relationships may affect engagement with animal welfare causes
Potential for Improved Engagement
- Developing Christian EA community
- Cultural translation of EA concepts
- Creating more accessible entry points for diverse Christian groups
- Considering where to draw the line with outreach, as EA cannot cater to everyone
Introduction
In this post, I will explore whether there are differences in how responsive different forms of Christianity are to EA. By various forms of Christianity, I refer not only to different denominations but also to inter- and intra-denominational variations, such as the conservative-liberal spectrum. This post focuses on the current representation of different Christian groups in EA and the possible reasons behind it. As there is only little hard data, a lot of what follows is (hopefully educated!) speculation.
Current Christian representation in EA
Based on EA for Christians community survey data and observations by me and others in the EACH team, the majority of Christians in EA are Protestants. There is a range from conservative evangelical types to liberals. There appears to be a scarcity of people on the very conservative end of the spectrum—this is not based on survey data but on my and other organisers’ observations. There are Christians identifying as evangelical, progressive, liberal, born-again, mere Christian and reformed. There are also Roman Catholics, but they may be underrepresented compared to protestants. However, it is hard to tell due to the small sample size in the EACH survey and the unreliability of intuitive estimates. Orthodox Christians are notably rare within the EA community; in addition to myself, I recall ever meeting maybe two others.
This distribution of different forms of Christianity in EA is at least partially explained by general EA demographics. The largest EA communities exist in Protestant-majority countries such as the UK and the US. The Church of England was the denomination with the most members in the EACH survey. The scarcity of Orthodox Christians is likely also related to geographic factors.
Cultural and ethical stumbling blocks
If there is a lack of non-Protestant Christians in EA, could the reason be that EA is in some ways culturally Protestant despite being a mostly secular community? I’ve seen people make this claim but also others pointing out it is suspect (‘Describing the average member of a movement with as many Jews as effective altruism as “culturally Protestant” is quite anti-Semitic’). But I have heard of some Catholics who have felt that EA is protestant, so apparently, something in EA registers as Protestant to some non-Protestant Christians. In the case of EACH in particular, this wouldn’t be surprising given the group is majority Protestant.
The common EA approach to ethics is consequentialist, perhaps with some obligation-based appeal. This may present challenges for Christians who have a more virtue ethics-oriented perspective. Catholic and Orthodox traditions especially have a strong virtue ethics element. Additionally, some Christians emphasize specific moral obligations tied to their personal relationships or convictions, leading to tensions with the impartiality central to EA's approach.
The most conservative Christians are absent
The lack of the most conservative protestant Christians seems not to be explainable only by geography, since fundamentalists are a sizable group in the US, especially as a share of protestant Christians in the US. It might seem obvious why EA has few fundamentalist Christians, but it’s worth spelling out nevertheless. Some of these factors also affect many other Christians to some degree, as well as some Muslims and Jews. The culture of EA is likely difficult for these Christians to engage with. EA tends to be liberal and leans left politically. The fundamentalist tendency to separate from non-Christians also makes engaging with a very secular movement difficult. Fundamentalists tend to distrust the scientific establishment, at least with regard to the theory of evolution, whereas EA is very pro-science and never considers creationist options when touching on matters of human origin or the biological history of life.
I’m somewhat hesitant to say this, but what EAs like to call epistemics also likely plays a role. It seems there’s a style present among fundamentalists that relies more on authoritative sources than on open empirical inquiry. To caveat, a similar style can be found among many other people as well, Christians or not, and EA epistemics is quite foreign to most people in general. Still, it seems plausible to me that among fundamentalists there would be relatively fewer people who are receptive to the EA style of thinking than in some other Christian populations.
Lower exposure to EA could also be an explaining factor. There isn’t much EA presence on campuses of universities like Bob Jones. It seems likely that people encounter EA in different social bubbles than those that fundamentalists and other Christians on the conservative end of the spectrum usually inhabit.
Doctrinal issues
Certain doctrinal stances might affect the receptiveness of different Christian groups to EA. Much could be written about these, but I’ll be brief. One such point of doctrine is eschatology. Those who are who think the Second Coming is sure or very likely to happen within decades would reject the concept of a prolonged future for humanity and hence longtermism. This kind of eschatological expectation is common among the more conservative protestants. Another stance that blurs the boundary between ethical and doctrinal is the relationship between humans and animals. Some Christians might perceive working on animal welfare as misdirected and reject EA because they see animal welfare being a prominent cause area in the movement.
Characteristic to both of these stances is that they lead to a rejection of only a particular cause area within EA. This would leave room to engage with the other parts. Picking the parts that fit one’s worldview is necessary for all EAs because EA contains multiple cause areas that can’t all be the most important one and the choice between them is affected by questions of worldview and morality.
Conclusions
In conclusion, certain types of Christians appear to be lacking in EA. Very conservative Protestants are underrepresented relative to their prevalence among US Christians. Non-Protestant Christians may also be underrepresented, but at least for Orthodox Christians geography is likely an explaining factor. There are theological reasons that may lead some Christian groups to reject certain EA causes, but this does not preclude engagement with other areas of EA. The culture of the EA movement and the way it discusses questions of morality and values likely present barriers to many Christians who would potentially be interested in EA, and it’s likely these tend to affect some groups of Christians more or differently than others. Some of this could likely be overcome by developing the Christian EA community and mapping the relationship between EA and Christianity further. This way a cultural translation of EA and a community that is easier to engage while still faithful to the core tenets of EA could be offered to a wider range of Christians. Significant work remains, particularly in engaging non-Protestant Christians. However, it's important to consider the extent to which these efforts should be pursued, as EA—whether Christian or not—cannot cater to everyone's beliefs and values.
Thanks for writing this!
A few general points:
On cause areas:
In the current meta, where longtermism is practically close enough to synonymous with x-risk reduction, any confident belief in the Second Coming may be sufficient to foreclose significant engagement with longtermism for many Christians. The Second Coming doesn't really work if there are no people left because the AI killed them all! I suspect similar rationales would be present in many other religions, either because they have their own eschatologies or because human extinction would seem at tension with a foundational belief in a deity who is at least mostly benevolent, at least nearly omnipotent, and interested in human welfare.
Even beyond that, other subfields in longtermism don't mesh as well with common Christian theological concepts. Transhumanism, digital minds, and similar concepts are likely to be non-starters for many Christians. In most Christian theologies, human beings are uniquely made[2] in the image of God and their creations would not share in that nature at all. Furthermore, EA thinking about the future may be seen as technoutopian, which is in tension with Christian theologies that identify sin (~ a religious version of evil or wrongdoing) as the fundamental cause of problems in the world. So EA thinking can come off as seeking mostly technological solutions to a spiritual problem.
Depending on their beliefs about soteriology, a Christian with longtermist tendencies might also focus on evangelism, theorizing that eternity is forever and that what happens in the life to come is far more important than what happens on earth.
My guess is that EA reasoning about cause prio, rather than beliefs about the need to reduce animal suffering per se, would be the major stumbling block here. After all, companion-animal charities have long been popular in the US, and I don't have any reason to think that US Christians were shunning them. But (e.g.) trying to quantify the moral weight of a chicken's welfare in comparison to that of a human is probably more likely to upset someone coming from a distinctly Christian point of view than (say) the median adult in a developed country. Suggesting that the resulting number is in the single digits, or that the meat-eater problem is relevant to deciding whether to donate to global health charities, is even more likely to be perceived as off-putting.[3] Cf. the discussion of humans as being made in the image of God above.
Yes, although we don't know what EA content the hypothetical person would find first (or early). If the first content they happen to see is about (e.g.) the meat-eater problem, they may not come back for a second helping even though they would have resonated with GH&D work. With GH&D declining in the meta, this may be a bigger issue than it would have been years ago.
Also, I think many people -- Christian or not -- would be less likely to engage with a community if a significant portion of community effort and energy was devoted to something they found silly, inappropriate, or inconsistent with their deeply-held values.[4]
"Full community" is not the greatest term. I mean something significantly more than an affinity group, but not necessarily something insular from other groups practicing EA-I. A full community can stand on its own two feet, as it were. To use a Christian metaphor, a church would ordinarily be a full community. One can receive the sacraments/ordinances, learn and study, obtain spiritual support and guidance, serve those who are less privileged, and get what we might consider the other key functions of a communal Christian life through a church. I'm less clear in my own mind on the key functions of a community practicing EA-I.
There are of course, many different views about what "made" means here!
I do not mean to express an opinion on the merits of these topics, or suggest that discussion of them should be avoided.
Again, I am not expressing endorsement of a norm that we shouldn't talk about or do certain things because some group of people would object to that.
Thanks for your comment, lots of great insights.
Yeah, I would also imagine some Christians, especially more conservative ones, are being turned off by some cultural practices in (some) EA groups. And those who usually move in explicitly Christian social circles might find interacting with a secular community difficult regardless.
The eschatology question is interesting. I think it can still make sense to work on what amounts practically to x-risk prevention even when expecting humans to be around at the Second Coming of Christ (or some eschatological event in other religions). If God doesn't want humans to go extinct, he could achieve this through human efforts to mitigate potential x-risks – the idea of God implementing his plans through the actions of humans is a familiar theme from the Bible. Also, setting humanity on a path to self-destruction that could only be halted by the return of Christ definitely doesn't sound like the kind of thing God wants humans to do, so working against it would seem like a good thing.
But a belief in the Second Coming does reduce the size of the future (unless one expects it to occur very far away in the future), so it undermines the astronomical value of far future oriented interventions.
I think you're right and it's the priorisation more than the cause itself, I should have been more clear about that.
Also, one can think that x-risk work is also generally effective in mitigating near-x-risk (e.g., a pandemic that "only" kills 99% of us). Particularly given the existence of the Genesis flood narrative, I expect most Christians would accept the possibility of a mass catastrophe that killed billions but less than everyone.