[zestyping]

The issue is primarily with motivated reasoning, not consequentialism, though naive consequentialism (also rampant in EA) can also be dangerous.

ETG encourages people to think of the positive side of what they're doing (donating money) without considering the negatives (harmful careers). Being rich, and focusing on getting rich as a goal, distorts your thinking.

[tomp]

The best paid careers are in HFT, which is far less harmful than e.g. ad optimisation (the business of most big tech)

[zestyping]

Interesting — could I hear your argument why?

[tomp]

The only people HFT “harms” are traders, i.e. voluntary participants in the “get rich” game who are likewise trying to win, but aren’t good enough.

BigTech ads are instead non-consensually forced upon people and steal their attention (best case) or manipulate their thoughts/desires (worst case)

[Dracophoenix]

> BigTech ads are instead non-consensually forced upon people and steal their attention (best case) or manipulate their thoughts/desires (worst case)

Those who make the ads and those who view them are voluntarily exchanging their time and attention with each other. They're traders in the same way high-frequency traders are.

[tomp]

maybe in theory, but in practice ads are everywhere and completely unavoidable in everyday life