He doesn't donate to EA causes, doesn't engage in the community, doesn't post in the Forum, doesn't subscribe to EA ideas (being truthseeking, caring about prioritization, caring about faraway humans or non-human animals, etc.) ... really nothing.
Yup, he attended that one conference in 2015 and promoted Will's book but neither of those makes him an EA.
With USAID cuts, I think he is a prime example of an anti-EA person because he's quite literally responsible for ~10K preventable deaths based on nationalistic, anti-impartialist grounds.
EA is intertwined with eugenics. Musk thinks he's fighting for a better future through eugenic culling. His certainty that his big brain can lead to better outcomes than asking people what they need is pretty in line with EA downsides.
I don't think everyone involved in EA is evil, but many of its leaders have endorsed eugenic ideas. "Elon isn't a true effective altruist because he's an evil Nazi" kind of ends up being a no true scotsman argument, imo.
Right, you could make the same argument about this guy. He might have completed an effective altruism fellowship and give vegan. But "he's not an EA" because he's in DOGE and "he can't be EA because EA is good by definition."
it just seems like after sam bankman-fried and now musk, it might be worth reevaluating your investment in EA, rather than just running around the internet insisting that these people aren't *really* EA.
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He doesn't donate to EA causes, doesn't engage in the community, doesn't post in the Forum, doesn't subscribe to EA ideas (being truthseeking, caring about prioritization, caring about faraway humans or non-human animals, etc.) ... really nothing.
With USAID cuts, I think he is a prime example of an anti-EA person because he's quite literally responsible for ~10K preventable deaths based on nationalistic, anti-impartialist grounds.