Many people are psychopaths, but most psychopaths do not lack empathy… they just disagree with some effective altruist ideas?
Lacking affective empathy is arguably one of the most defining characteristics of psychopathy, so I don’t think this is a good example.
Instead, think of all the peripheral things that people associate with psychopathy and that probably do correlate with it (and often serve as particularly salient examples or cause people to get “unmasked”), but may not always go together. Take those away.
For instance,
Sadism – you can have psychopaths who are no more sadistic than your average person. (Many may still act more sadistically on average because they don’t have prosocial emotions counterbalancing the low-grade sadistic impulses that you’d also find in lots of neurotypical people.)
Lack of conscientiousness and “parasitic lifestyle” – some psychopaths have self-control and may even be highly conscientious. See the claims about how, in high-earning professions that reward ruthlessness (e.g., banking, some types of law, some types of management), a surprisingly high percentage of high-performers have psychopathic traits.
Disinterested in altruism of any sort – some psychopaths may be genuinely into EA but may be tempted to implement it more SBF-style. (See also my comment here.)
Obsessed with social standing/power/interpersonal competition. Some may focus on excelling at a non-social hobby (“competition with nature”) that provides excitement that would otherwise be missing in an emotionally dulled life (something about “shallow emotions” is IMO another central characteristic of psychopathy, though there’s probably more specificity to it). E.g., I wouldn’t be shocked if the free-solo climber Alex Honnold were on some kind of “psychopathy spectrum,” but I might be wrong (and if he was, I’d still remain a fan). I’m only speculating based on things like “they measured his amygdala/-activation and it was super small.”
Lacking affective empathy is arguably one of the most defining characteristics of psychopathy, so I don’t think this is a good example.
Instead, think of all the peripheral things that people associate with psychopathy and that probably do correlate with it (and often serve as particularly salient examples or cause people to get “unmasked”), but may not always go together. Take those away.
For instance,
Sadism – you can have psychopaths who are no more sadistic than your average person. (Many may still act more sadistically on average because they don’t have prosocial emotions counterbalancing the low-grade sadistic impulses that you’d also find in lots of neurotypical people.)
Lack of conscientiousness and “parasitic lifestyle” – some psychopaths have self-control and may even be highly conscientious. See the claims about how, in high-earning professions that reward ruthlessness (e.g., banking, some types of law, some types of management), a surprisingly high percentage of high-performers have psychopathic traits.
Disinterested in altruism of any sort – some psychopaths may be genuinely into EA but may be tempted to implement it more SBF-style. (See also my comment here.)
Obsessed with social standing/power/interpersonal competition. Some may focus on excelling at a non-social hobby (“competition with nature”) that provides excitement that would otherwise be missing in an emotionally dulled life (something about “shallow emotions” is IMO another central characteristic of psychopathy, though there’s probably more specificity to it). E.g., I wouldn’t be shocked if the free-solo climber Alex Honnold were on some kind of “psychopathy spectrum,” but I might be wrong (and if he was, I’d still remain a fan). I’m only speculating based on things like “they measured his amygdala/-activation and it was super small.”