I was surprised by the weakness of this article, regardless the potential absurdities of parts of EA.
Why does The Economist consider this the most important issue this week, in a world of complex problems, to splash its first leader on (and more than one page long too)?
Why would a movement which started as nerds buying mosquito nets to stop malaria be "a bunch [of] post hoc justifications for bad behaviour"? You say this like it's an established fact or at least a common argument, yet I've never heard it before.
I can't answer your question as to why, but the only person that has ever tried to convince me to consider effective altruism was in charge of marketing for the New Zealand Taxpayer's Union (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_Taxpayers%27_Union" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_Taxpayers%27_Union). Even at the time (without knowing much about EA) it seemed immediately clear that this person was essentially 'ethics washing'.
wodow · · focus · HN ↗
Why does The Economist consider this the most important issue this week, in a world of complex problems, to splash its first leader on (and more than one page long too)?
__MatrixMan__ · · focus · HN ↗
> Actually, if you think real hard about it, we're the good guys
--the bad guys
The economist likes it because it resembles what their target audience tells themselves so they can sleep at night.
strken · · focus · HN ↗
tmnvix · · focus · HN ↗