Month: January 2018

My second reading experience was very different from my first. The first read through I did I was reading more to become familiar with the text and the message it was trying to portray.  After discussing different parts of the essay in class today and after looking at the Effective  Altruism website, I feel as though my understanding of what the topic of the essay was is stronger. Therefore as I read the essay a second time I was reading much more critically. I disagreed with more statements made, as well as felt as though more parts of the essay were contradicting.

One particular part of the essay I picked up on during my second read through was about a retreat. Southern states two important Das that introduced him to the movement, “…were heading to East Devon with a few others for a cottage retreat, where they were going to relax among sheep and alpacas, visit a ruined abbey, and get some altruism-related writing done”. I could this extremely interesting for a few reasons. First, they were going on a retreat and “relaxing” and I am not sure how this directly helps those suffering, which is the main goal of EAs to do with their lives. Second, they were getting “altruism-related writing done”, but isn’t writing considered a form of art, even if it is for educational or informative reasons. Therefore, isn’t art needed to help their movement thrive and spread to others around the world. The Effective Altruism movement claims to not need art and to use their lives to make the greatest impact possible on global suffering; based on these two passages taken from the essay one could argue that EAs can sometimes contradict themselves.

Glossing the text definitely helped me to better understand the text. By looking up the words I did not quite understand and using the definitions given to then make sense of the statement made I could better understand what the paragraph’s message or point given to the reader was. I looked up the words lucrative (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/lucrative?s=t), egalitarianism (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/egalitarianism?s=t), crass materialism (http://www.univsource.com/words/crass-adj.htm), anti-apartheid (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/anti-apartheid?s=ts), and serendipitous (http://www.dictionary.com/browse/serendipitous?s=t). In parenthesis is the hyperlink to the definitions I found for each word. These definitions helped me to further understand the essay.

Multiple points brought up by Rhys Southan in “Is Art a Waste of Time?” caused me to react to the writing. One statement in particular, “The idea that someone’s book, film, painting, or dance could be their way to reduce the world’s suffering struck Hilton as bizarre, almost to the point of incoherence” made me stop and think. I made a note next to this statement that said, “weird because music does this for people”. By “world’s suffering” Southan is referencing global poverty. Music might not directly solve global poverty, but in different ways it can definitely help. Multiple artists each year put on charity concerts to raise money for different global problems such as poverty. The music those artist make draws a crowd that pays to listen to some of their favorite music. That money raised goes to a charity, but it is the music that draws people in; therefore indirecting music can help to reduce world suffering. Furthermore, music can be an outlet for those who are suffering. Whether it is listening to their favorite artist or a song that resonates with them and makes them feel as though they are not alone, or it could be writing their own music as a way to escape their suffering. No matter the reason why people turn to art, such as music, I believe that music and art can help to reduce global suffering in ways that might be indirect, but are still impactful.

Along a similar thought another line made me pause and think for a minute. The line, “But the gauntlet that EA throws down is simply this: does your preferred good deed make as much of a difference as simply handing over the money? If not, how good a deed is it really?” caused me to stop and reflect. I was puzzled because shouldn’t any good deed or effort given to help a good cause like reducing poverty be accepted. Not everyone is going to be able to hand over a substantially amount of money that would make a dent in reducing global suffering. Although every penny counts in making the difference, some people just can not afford that. I believe that any action, gesture, effort, or amount of money given to help reduce world suffering should be accepted and appreciated as an attempt to help others.