Comments
This project sounds great, I love how you flesh out the plan and pre-commit to it.
I have a minor concern, which might be mistaken as I don't have any relevant experience. In the "what we can learn from religious texts"-section you mentioned potential applications to community building and spreading ideas. However, the process involves a synthesis of verses more directly related to EA. Also, I imagine that general lessons about how religious communities and ideas evolved have been investigated quite a bit in the academy and might have used historical sources and sociological methods. So all this makes me less excited about these specific applications.
On the other hand, I hope that it will inform more about how to communicate better with religious groups and lead to a better understanding of how EA-related views were seen in the past.
Also, David Manheim is doing some work on the space of Judaism and EA.
These lectures on historical analysis of the New Testament are neat and might be of interest to you. They give good context for understanding the contemporaneous interpretation of scripture.
The religious texts I am familiar with contain calls for charity, but not much on making it effective.
It is also worth considering that the relation between the contents of religious texts and their adherents actual actions is kind of complicated. Very often even devout followers do not follow the prescriptions of their religious texts, but the content of religious texts clearly have some influence.
This kind of pursuit is something I am interested in, and I'm glad to see you pursue it.
One thing you could look for, if you want, is the "psychological constitution" being written by a text. People are psychological beings and the ideas they hold or try to practice shape their overall psychological makeup, affecting how they feel about things and act. So, in the Bhagavad-Gita, we are told that it is good to be detached from the fruits of action, but to act anyway. What effect would that idea have if EAs took it (to the extent that they haven't already)? Or a whole population? (Similarly with its advice to meditate.) EAs psychologically relate with the fruits of their action, in some way, already. The theistic religions can blend relationship with ideals or truth itself with relationship with a person. What difference would that blending make to EAs or the population at large? I would guess it would produce a different kind of knowing -- maybe not changing object-level beliefs (although it could), but changing the psychology of believing (holding an ideal as a relationship to a person or a loyalty to a person rather than an impersonal law, for instance).
I highly recommend the Bodhicaryavatara by Shantideva! It's the most significant ethical text of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, with some serious Madhyamaka metaphysics sprinkled in. I'm currently writing my undergrad thesis on it, and I'd be happy to talk about it.
Here's a great guide: https://www.shambhala.com/guide-to-the-way-of-the-bodhisattva/. I took an intensive course on the Bodhicaryavatara in the traditional monastic style in Kathmandu, Nepal; see https://ryi.org/programs/degree-programs if you really want to dive deep. The school is currently offering all courses online.
I'm also studying The Ladder of Divine Ascent by St. John Climacus, with the accessible commentary Thirty Steps to Heaven by Vassilios Papavassiliou. St. John is venerated in both the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church, but he gets more attention from the Orthodox. I find Orthodoxy fascinating because it has such a mystical relationship-oriented spirituality compared to the legalistic style of both Catholicism and Protestantism. However, this text focuses on individual spirituality; there's not much discussion of ethics.
Cool project! For the Tanakh (aka Hebrew bible aka old testament) a great resource is Sepharia.org. An important element of Judaism is not just the original Tanakh but also rabbinic commentary on it (as well as commentary on the commentary). This is codified into the Talmud and other documents. Sepharia allows you to search the Tanakh as well as the Talmud and other commentary--for instance, here are the results for a search for "Tzedakah" (not a direct translation to charity but encompasses charity). You can also click on a particular passage, for instance, Isaiah 58:7-8 ("share your bread with the hungry, And to take the wretched poor into your home; When you see the naked, to clothe him...") and see all the commentary about that passage. If you want to chat about Judaism specifically when you get to that part of your project feel free to get in touch!
It sounds similar to this project from 5 years ago.
Hi Tony. I could be interested in looking into Islam with you.
Summary
I am starting a project to read a number of core religious texts through the lens of Effective Altruism. I am interested in both seeing what can be learnt from religious texts by Effective Altruism and how Effective Altruism may inform, even to a small extent, the interpretation and application of religious texts in our modern world.
If this project is something that may be of interest to you or if you otherwise have advice on how to proceed, please feel free to comment publicly or reach out to me directly. Additionally, I look forward to sharing what I learn periodically with the community.
I do not have expertise in reading religious texts and as such would be very appreciative of advice or thoughts on:
Key Caveats
I understand that religion naturally brings up many challenges and concerns (it is of course a part of the old trope of things not to discuss at a dinner party). My goals through this project are not to make determinations on the validity of people’s religious views. Furthermore, I will not proselytize on the existence or otherwise of God (or other religious figures).
I hope to take a textual approach to reviewing texts, wherein I will focus largely on the words in the texts and supplement with secondary materials minimally. This is only insofar as to better contextualize the words of the text to align with the intent of the authors (I understand that this is already fraught with potential biases).
I come to this project with my own biases (which I shall detail out further). I understand that this will influence how I read the texts, as any reading of a text will be highly influenced by one’s own context, but I aim to be transparent about these biases to the extent I may be able.
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Background
Recently I have been interested in thinking about how those outside of the Effective Altruism community think about giving and altruism more generally. This interest has often led me into conversations about the role that religion plays. Considerations of ‘doing good’ are of course not unique to the Effective Altruism movement and have their roots deeply embedded in religion and the human condition more generally.
In reviewing what has been written on the EA Forum and more broadly, I was surprised to see how little appears to have been written on the topic (a sentiment observed in this piece). A fair argument was posited in the article, “A Response To Making Discussions In EA Groups Inclusive” that conversations about religion can lead to less inclusive spaces for discussion. I am highly sympathetic to this position, especially where such discussions focus on aiming to convert the reader or seek to argue for the merits of various religious views at the expense of other views.
I do believe that there is an opportunity for the EA movement to constructively engage with elements of religious texts. Core religious texts have had an incredible influence on moral views of large swathes of humanity over the last 2,000+ years. A fair counter argument is that primary religious texts themselves form only a part of the reason for the success of certain religions and that other contextual investigations including historical, anthropological and political studies are required (see for example). I agree with this argument, and do not wish to overstate the value of an exercise that focuses just on a textual analysis of religious texts themselves.
However, I would argue that a project such as this may be able to start conversations around the following:
From a personal perspective, I have some some additional goals including:
Process
At the outset of the project, I plan to read the following texts: Tanakh, Catholic Bible, Quran, Bhagavad Gita and Tripitaka. Prior to reading each text, I plan to do some research on how to read the texts in order to maximize the value of the exercise given my goals. This research will include conversations with people who have experience with the texts themselves. I shall synthesize key verses from the texts in a publicly viewable Google Sheet with a specific focus on the following:
Personal Context
Naturally, I come to this project with my own biases and cultural context which will influence how I read and perceive religious texts. I do not consider myself a religious person; however, I was brought up in the Roman Catholic faith. If I were to put a label on my religious beliefs currently, I would say I am agnostic. Furthermore, I have spent the vast majority of my life in Anglo-Western communities and as such have engaged significantly more with interpretations of the Tanakh and Catholic Bible than of any other religious texts that I plan to read. I work for an EA-aligned organization that operates in the global poverty alleviation space and I spend most of my time focused on activities in India.
It is my hope that this project may help start productive conversations that will add to the overall discourse and application of Effective Altruism in our wider world. Please do not hesitate to message me directly with questions or concerns.
Hey Tony, have you heard of or joined the Christians and Effective Altruism facebook group? Some of them might be interested in this project, such as reading the Catholic Bible or other Christian texts with you, or they might be interested in what your output is from this.
There's a Buddhists in Effective Altruism group as well.