If you want to understand the world, work in science. If you want to do good in the world, work in Effective Altruism. Or tech. If you want to pretend to do good for the social approval of others, work in 'social justice'.
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I agree, of course, but sometimes people's ability to calculate outcomes isn't completely accurate. The road to Hell is paved with good intentions, right? I'm reminded of the non-linearity of the Chinese proverb Sai Weng lost his horse.https://www.thoughtco.com/chinese-proverbs-sai-weng-lost-his-horse-2278437 …
Yes, this is why EA tries to be very epistemically humble about long-term predictions, and to focus on the least contentious issues, like it's probably good to avoid nuclear winter that extinguishes all human life.
