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bogus comments on [Link] Huffington Post article promoting Effective Altruist ideas - Less Wrong Discussion

7 Post author: Gleb_Tsipursky 04 December 2015 02:02AM

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Comment author: Elo 04 December 2015 03:36:51AM *  3 points [-]

However, my close friend Max Harms pointed out that Make-A-Wish Foundation makes 300 million per year telling these stories.


Would not my goal of helping kids have good lives be achieved better by protecting them from death?


That question stopped me in my tracks. I had to think hard about why I gave to Make-A-Wish. I realized it was because they had heartwarming stories and great marketing that brought the stories to my attention.

There is a risk known to EA that if not done carefully; Suggesting that people's charitable donations are going to cause them:

-- a deep churning in my stomach -- when I found out what bad decisions I made by giving

without very carefully and explicitly guiding them to the better choice; will cause them to instead of:

switch from 1 charity to another;
not give to any charity.

Effectively causing the QALY change to decrease.

My criticisms of this article:
While it tries; it is not careful enough. It is likely to have a negative impact; not a positive one.

Comment author: bogus 04 December 2015 05:20:26PM 0 points [-]

-- a deep churning in my stomach -- when I found out what bad decisions I made by giving

That seemed wrong to me too. Donating to Make-A-Wish is not a bad decision; if anything, it probably buys more QALY's than just spending the money on the latest tech gadget for yourself (Experiences being more happiness-promoting than material possessions, and all that). However, there are choices that are vastly better, and these alternatives should definitely be the focus of the article.

Comment author: Gleb_Tsipursky 06 December 2015 01:40:23AM -1 points [-]

Yup, the point I was trying to make was that when I found out about better alternatives, I had decision regret about my past decisions.