[ck113]

All due respect, I don't think you're getting what Robin Hanson is about. (Which is understandable if this is the only post of his you've ever read.)

The point of this post isn't to criticize Alex Grass's choices, it's to point out that our social system has a rather bizarre bias. We applaud Grass's spending money on these charities -- presumably because it's an ostensibly selfless act -- despite the fact that he actually did more social good by making the money than he did by giving it away. (Not saying I agree, just trying to clarify.)

A running theme, maybe the primary theme, in this blog is that people make deeply suboptimal choices (whether measured by social interest or self interest) because they're really more interested in sending signals than they are in achieving optimal outcomes.

The blog is worth a longer look; for me, I don't know how much I agree with Hanson's signaling-centric view of the world, but I'm impressed with how deeply he thinks about these things, and how he manages to talk about these topics without devolving into misanthropically simplified "people are dumb" conclusions.

[noonespecial]

You are correct in assuming that I've read very little Robin Hanson. I'll definitely give it a further look.

I've just become tired recently of every large (and usually socially beneficial) charitable donation being followed by a wake of "how could he/she have used his/her oversized wealth for that cause when there are so many more worthy causes that I care about?"

[gamache]

The point is not that the money went to a valid cause that the author doesn't care about; the point is that the money went to an invalid cause. Which is fine and legal and all, but it's not really charity.

[noonespecial]

Actually, upon further reading, I think ck113 has got it dead on. Its not about the money, the individual or even the charity where the money actually ended up. Its about the bizarre social pressures that drive the decisions.

Wish the blog post had spent a few extra sentences setting up some context for those of us who are less "Hanson literate".

[yters]

My question is whether the signalling is actually approaches a deeper optimal.

For example, I seem to be more deeply motivated by things like relationships with others and ideals, than naked self interest or societal interest. These suboptimal choices Hanson points out signal to others the value of the less physically based motivations for themselves. I start to lose hope if I think I'm the only one who has such ideals and somewhat question my own sanity. But, when others signal that these ideals are actually crucial to their own decision making, I feel I'm not the only one and am more motivated to follow them.

But, how do such ideals related to naked self and societal interest? Well, the ideals tend to motivate the deeper insights we generate, and motivate people to work together voluntarily without the overhead of contracts and reward/punishment systems. I would argue that while perhaps inefficient in the short term, these "biases" actually turn out to be much, much more efficient in the long term. I.e. just look at what happens when people do lose hope. They don't suddenly become productivity monsters, instead they tend to turn both self and other destructive. Definitely not creating value in terms of self and societal interest here...