A moment of clarity or something.
Effective Altruism says the biggest bet is the only bet. Normal bets on stock prices or football scores or arson or assassination are pocket change. The only bet worth making is 50% odds on obliterating the world. Abolish jobs and business, bulldoze the bipeds. If you think there’s a 50.1% chance that you will gain trillions by obliterating everything else, GO FOR IT!
We connect Effective Altruism with the tech monsters like Sam and Elon. It’s a valid connection but not the only connection.
If the tech monsters were the only EA devils in the world they wouldn’t get very far.
If they tried to peddle their Big Bet to the stock market of the 1950s they’d be locked out of the room. The market under harsh New Deal constraints was stuck with the lint on pocket change. They had to survive on hopelessly boring dull investments like factories and farms, betting that improved wheat breeds or a more attractive line of clothing would bring more profit.
Political changes in the 1980s freed them from the horrible Negative Externalities of profits and products and peasants. Now they live in a wonderful Platonic universe of abstract numbers and pure odds. Destroying the universe doesn’t matter because the universe doesn’t exist in their minds.
Polistra's Mill 