“Caring less” was in the air. People were noticing the phenomenon. People were trying to explain it. In a comment, I realized that I was in effect telling people to care less about things without realizing what I was doing. All we needed was a concise post to crystallize the concept, and eukaryote obliged.
The post, especially the beginning, gets straight to the point. It asks the question of why we don’t hear more persuasion in the form of “care less”, offers a realistic example and a memorable graphic, and calls to action. This is the part that was most useful to me—it gave me a clear handle on something that I’ve been thinking about for a while. I’m a big fan of telling people to care less, and once I realized that this is what I was doing I learned to expect more psychological resistance from people. I’m less direct now when encouraging people to care less, and often phrase it in terms of trade-offs by telling people that caring less about something (usually, national politics and culture wars) will free up energy to care more about things they already endorse as more important (usually, communities and relationships).
The post talks about the guilt and anxiety induced by ubiquitous “care more” messaging, and I think it’s taking this too much for granted. An alternative explanation is that people who are not scrupulous utilitarian Effective Altruists are quite good at not feeling guilt and anxiety, which leaves room for “care more” messaging to proliferate. I wish the post made more distinction between the narrow world of EA and the broader cultural landscape, I fear that it may be typical-minding somewhat.
Finally, eukaryote throws out some hypotheses that explain the asymmetry. This part seems somewhat rushed and not fully thought out. As a quick brainstorming exercise it could be better as just a series of bullet points, as the 1-2 paragraph explanations don’t really add much. As some commenters pointed out and as I wrote in an essay inspired by this post, eukaryote doesn’t quite suggest the “Hansonian” explanation that seems obviously central to me. Namely: “care more about X” is a claim for status on behalf of the speaker, who is usually someone who has strong opinions and status tied up with X. This is more natural and more tolerable to people than “care less about Y”, which reads as an attack on someone else’s status and identity—often the listener themselves since they presumably care about Y.
Instead of theorizing about the cause of the phenomenon, I think that the most useful follow ups to this post would be figuring out ways to better communicate “care less” messages and observing what actually happens if such messages are received. Even if one does not buy the premise that “care less” messaging is relaxing and therapeutic, it is important to have that in one’s repertoire. And the first step towards that is having the concept clearly explained in a public way that one can point to, and that is the value of this post.
“Caring less” was in the air. People were noticing the phenomenon. People were trying to explain it. In a comment, I realized that I was in effect telling people to care less about things without realizing what I was doing. All we needed was a concise post to crystallize the concept, and eukaryote obliged.
The post, especially the beginning, gets straight to the point. It asks the question of why we don’t hear more persuasion in the form of “care less”, offers a realistic example and a memorable graphic, and calls to action. This is the part that was most useful to me—it gave me a clear handle on something that I’ve been thinking about for a while. I’m a big fan of telling people to care less, and once I realized that this is what I was doing I learned to expect more psychological resistance from people. I’m less direct now when encouraging people to care less, and often phrase it in terms of trade-offs by telling people that caring less about something (usually, national politics and culture wars) will free up energy to care more about things they already endorse as more important (usually, communities and relationships).
The post talks about the guilt and anxiety induced by ubiquitous “care more” messaging, and I think it’s taking this too much for granted. An alternative explanation is that people who are not scrupulous utilitarian Effective Altruists are quite good at not feeling guilt and anxiety, which leaves room for “care more” messaging to proliferate. I wish the post made more distinction between the narrow world of EA and the broader cultural landscape, I fear that it may be typical-minding somewhat.
Finally, eukaryote throws out some hypotheses that explain the asymmetry. This part seems somewhat rushed and not fully thought out. As a quick brainstorming exercise it could be better as just a series of bullet points, as the 1-2 paragraph explanations don’t really add much. As some commenters pointed out and as I wrote in an essay inspired by this post, eukaryote doesn’t quite suggest the “Hansonian” explanation that seems obviously central to me. Namely: “care more about X” is a claim for status on behalf of the speaker, who is usually someone who has strong opinions and status tied up with X. This is more natural and more tolerable to people than “care less about Y”, which reads as an attack on someone else’s status and identity—often the listener themselves since they presumably care about Y.
Instead of theorizing about the cause of the phenomenon, I think that the most useful follow ups to this post would be figuring out ways to better communicate “care less” messages and observing what actually happens if such messages are received. Even if one does not buy the premise that “care less” messaging is relaxing and therapeutic, it is important to have that in one’s repertoire. And the first step towards that is having the concept clearly explained in a public way that one can point to, and that is the value of this post.