= 27d567bc2d48d9f40e9ccc20ea370b15)
almondguy comments on Open thread, 7-14 July 2014 - Less Wrong Discussion
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
= 783df68a0f980790206b9ea87794c5b6)
Loading…= b715d02e85f7b3b4ae65ca3d3e450868)
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Powered by Reddit
= f037147d6e6c911a85753b9abdedda8d)
You are viewing a comment permalink. View the original post to see all comments and the full post content.
Comments (232)
suppose someone's life plan was to largely devote themselves to making money until they were in, say, the top 10% in cumulative income. They also did not plan to save money to any very unusual extent.
then after that was accomplished, they would switch goals and devote themselves to altruism.
Given that the person today is able to make the money and resolves to do this, I wonder what people here think the chance is of doing it. For example, fluid intelligence declines over time. So by the time you're 60 years old and have made your money and have kids, will you really be smart enough to diametrically change direction and have much impact? Maybe Bill Gates has enough brain cells, but his IQ might be 160. And maybe you'll just forget about altruism and learn to enjoy nice cars more.
It doesn't seem that unusual for rich people to become more charitable as they get older, though perhaps I'm just hearing about the famous ones. I assume a large part of it is feeling as though one has solved the money-making game, and now it's time to do something new. (Rich people getting into politics is probably similar.)
Is anything known about how to maintain fluid intelligence?
A Google search turned up a few articles:
A quick look into some trends:
This report suggests a non-monotonic relationship but maybe a positive correlation between income and percentage of income donated to charity. Unfortunately, this depressingly suggests a negative correlation. (Edit It seems non-monotonic over some intervals but negative overall. Further edit I don't have high confidence either way. Alexander Berger, a research analyst at GiveWell, thinks the piece in The Atlantic is just wrong. I note that some studies are citing "discretionary income" or income with a whole bunch of expenses subtracted out.)
This doesn't seem to list percentages but gives the impression of increasing giving with age. And it's the same story in the UK. Edit This is better:
You'll probably be fine. From what my parents say, you keep gaining effectiveness due to cunning, practice, and ability to see the obvious. At least until 65 or so, and not necessarily in all professions.
If you're particularly concerned for some reason, you might want to make a habit of giving to charity (not necessarily large amounts, but enough to form the habit). Using a contract to force yourself also sounds cool, but is probably just asking for trouble.
altruism doesn't take a lot of intelligence. something like 95 percent of American households give to charity. The biggest factor by far will be commitment, not capability.