$250k books sold, to save lives(sive.rs) |
$250k books sold, to save lives(sive.rs) |
I recently read both his books. Hell yeah or no I imagined I would love...and was right...but boy was I surprised by your music and people. It’s a book about friendship and authenticity, disguised as a branding book for musicians.
I posit his ideas will stand the test of time. Highly suggest reading :) — and darn happy that the orders went to help those in need
2. From all appearances, he gave the money away out of generosity rather than the need for recognition. Didn't strike me as celebrity self aggrandizement.
3. He felt both the what and the how are worth publicizing. He's a known 'thought leader' after all.
Of the three, only the third is remotely objectionable. I think it's ok to say good things about oneself doing good things.
I bet it's correlated with generosity and more likely to be so than the mean spiritedness that comes from wagging a finger at those who are putting themselves out there.
https://www.givewell.org/charities/amf
You might also want to read this meta-discussion by GiveWell on such analyses:
https://blog.givewell.org/2011/08/18/why-we-cant-take-expect...
Interestingly, offering myself a choice between an arbitrary human life and a nice meal, I find myself choosing the meal. So I value the arbitrary human life at under a hundred dollars.
Just curious to me. I would have expected to have picked a higher valuation.
https://www.gwern.net/docs/philo/2011-yvain-deadchild.html
I think it's a classic!
This isn't to even remotely take away from what Derek did – I've been a fan for years, and this was one of the coolest blog posts I've read in a long time. It's the opposite... I just don't want anyone to feel like they're killing someone every time they pay rent.
Perhaps undeserved, though. The real realization is that even knowing this, I will not change my actions, i.e. it isn't ignorance. The practice of what I do is that I value an arbitrary human life pretty lowly.
I think if you gave me a live feed of a child dying, I would certainly pay the $5k to stop the child from dying, or the $10k, or the whatever. But even the slightest distance and I wouldn't send $20 over. Odd. I can even visualize the child and it feels a bit bad but I'll still take the super burrito.
If the numbers are to be believed, the comparison would be more like one human life for every coffee you buy(<$4 to save a human life).
Instead of going to Penguin to get his book published, he decided to try doing the whole process himself. That included getting translations done, coordinating printing, building a webstore, etc.
It's pretty cool tbh
Broadcasting it to the entire world charity to show the world how generous or or good one is, is uncharitable. This is just someone getting ego trip after spending 250k that they did not need.
A society in which status seeking individuals are incentivized to publically save lives with their money is a healthy society.
None of us are that impressive in the shadows. We're all a little performative, at our core.
May as well use our instinct for performance for good.
What’s wrong with someone doing good and taking credit?
Heck, what’s wrong with them doing good solely for the credit? As long as doing good is the side effect, good is done
Is it because you don’t enjoy it as much, knowing who did it? Bit selfish. Or maybe it makes your own anonymous charitable works (or lack thereof) feel not as good? It’s a lot of money but this isn’t a race!
Even the celebs are paying the "tour guides", what they've created is an industry where people pretend to be poor to make a living.
The problem is it's easy to get good publicity even when things get worse instead of getting better.
Also, it doesn't hurt to have some pride when you do good things.
Your comment makes it less likely that others will broadcast their charitable giving, result in less people being prompted to give, and overall reduce the amount of giving in the world; all for no gain for yourself or anyone else. You want "a bit sad"? Dwell on that for a while.
My point is that by not acknowledging the selfish part of "wanting the credit", the author comes off as not self aware [or disingenuous, but let's give them the benefit of the doubt]. That's what I meant by cheapening it for them.
I don't follow. Does broadcasting this on the internet reduce the number of lives saved? The point of altruism to save lives, so as long as those are maximized, I don't see any "cheapening" happening.
The number of lives saved remains the same whether you broadcast it or not.
So, what's the point in broadcasting?
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1zLmPuddUmKsy3v55AfG_...
Re: "cheapening", who exactly is ranking the charitable act and why does their perspective matter? I was raised with that ideology but eventually abandoned it.
Nowadays, I care a lot more that something helpful is done that the signaling attempt to admit our desire for recognition or hide our involvement in the good deed because that mindset prevents a lot of helpful giving in my experience.
"But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing"
A lot of charity is not for the sake of helping someone, but for the sake of making oneself to look noble, get publicity, or earn money (like those "buy X, then we will donate Y" promos).
Personally I don't have such bad feelings about that, as it is a win-win situation very often - those who need get something eventually. I can tolerate a little bit of hypocrisy in that case.
From a purely utilitarian perspective, it make no difference. If it encourages others to follow suit, its a net bonus if anything.
The reason I started giving to AMF was because a friend of mine posted about their giving to AMF. I would have been less likely to do so if I hadn't seen that post, so broadcasting probably led to more lives saved. Another friend of mine said he was also motivated to give by seeing the very same post.
Anyway, I didn't claim that broadcasting is positive, or has a point. I simply responded to the claim that broadcasting "cheapens" altruism.