Effective altruism seems to focus like a laser on the most valuable problems for human suffering, but what if we extend the metaphor further, and to increase the impact make it a pulse laser? (Part of my inspiration was debt jubilees) I think this could have a few effects:
Many issues can be solved with large piles of cash that can't be solved with smaller ones, such as building a well vs importing water
on the donor side, it could be a Schelling point. Hey, those EA folks only come around every few years, now I can blow off other donors the
Currently, EA resources are not gained gradually year by year; instead, they're gained in big leaps (think of Openphil and FTX). Therefore it might not make sense to accumulate resources for several years and give them out all at once.
In fact, there is a call for megaprojects in EA, which echos your point 1 and 3 (though these megaprojects are not expected to funded by accumulating resources over the years, but by directly deploying existing resources). I'm not sure if I understand your second point though.
Pulse charity:
Effective altruism seems to focus like a laser on the most valuable problems for human suffering, but what if we extend the metaphor further, and to increase the impact make it a pulse laser? (Part of my inspiration was debt jubilees) I think this could have a few effects:
- Many issues can be solved with large piles of cash that can't be solved with smaller ones, such as building a well vs importing water
- on the donor side, it could be a Schelling point. Hey, those EA folks only come around every few years, now I can blow off other donors the
... (read more)