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Comment by athinggoingon | Hacker News Reader

She is one of the devils in nerd's clothing: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidjeans/2022/11/12/the-devil...

She was an advocate of effective altruism who seems to be part of a conspiracy to have pilfered billions of dollars from investors: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/users/carolineellison

But what's really interesting about her deleted Goodreads account is the last books she was in the midst of reading:

The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia

The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York

The Metropolitan Man

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> effective altruism who seems to be part of a conspiracy to have pilfered billions of dollars from investor

If I'm understanding you correctly - which perhaps I'm not - I don't know as I agree. Are you saying that the concept of "effective altruism" is "part of a consp..."?

The concept of effective altruism, as far as I know, is simply to maximize the good-accomplished-per-dollar. In the past, after being pointed there by proponents of effective altruism, I've donated to organizations giving malaria nets, etc.

If you are saying this, I'd appreciate knowing more about what backs up your claim.

But if you're saying that there's some entity cloaking itself as 'effective altruism' but carrying out a Ponzi scheme, then that I'd have no opinion on.

I think the argument is that a huge number of the EA types have been caught without their pants on in the FTX / SBF / Alameda fiasco. Those like Will McAskill have distanced themselves, but it still gives the collection of people a look that isn't great, even if it doesn't tarnish the conceptual basis of EA, as philosophized. Perhaps in practice, maximizing wealth leads ones to do morally sketchy things under the moral cover of maximizing good.

> Perhaps in practice, maximizing wealth leads ones to do morally sketchy things under the moral cover of maximizing good.

And perhaps, in the process of maximizing wealth for good, the goblin whispers in your ear to keep some for yourself.

> She was an advocate of effective altruism who seems to be part of a conspiracy

What if she gets much more happy about keeping the money than those it used to belong to?

Then surely this is most effective.

Effective altruism has lead to funny conclusions in the past such as:

Spend all the money on animal welfare (PeTA), or spend no money on the environment (Bjørn Lomborg).

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