How Effective Altruism Lost Its Way: Matt Johnson's 2023 Essay Still Holds Up
inductionheads · x · 2026-09-17
clairlemon resurfaces Matt Johnson's 2023 Quillette essay 'How Effective Altruism Lost Its Way', arguing it has aged well.
Key points:
- Traces EA's origins: Giving What We Can (2009) and 80,000 Hours (2011), with Will MacAskill driving naming and marketing choices
- Charts the movement's drift from bed-net-style direct interventions toward long-termism and AI doomerism
- Calls for EA to rediscover humanism
A deep retrospective on the intellectual evolution of EA and AI x-risk discourse.
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