I was struck by a passage from Barack Obama's recent autobiography, describing how each day in the oval office, he would read 10 letters from concerned citizens, and occasionally direct government agencies to reach out and help one. He didn't feel a lot of accomplishment from this, however, because he knew that for each individual he helped, there were tens of thousands struggling in the wake of the financial crisis.
I thought this passage was interesting, because while this sort of dejection might be appropriate for a person trying to maximize their impact at the helm of a huge bureaucratic apparatus, it would be a totally counterproductive attitude for many everyday citizens just trying to help out their communities. Clearly our society needs people with a wide distribution on the intended-scale-of-impact trait, and maybe individuals should also have their own distribution over the scale their various activities act on...?
As a PhD student, I felt for a long time that the highest EV thing I could do was learn things or work on projects, but as I've started to appreciate the miniscule impact most papers (...even many fields... lol) have, I've started to question whether that was the right call.
I was just curious how people here think about this. How do you approach diversifying the scale of impact of things you work on?
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Notes -
I think thinking highly locally should be the default for nearly everyone. In many ways, what “character” is is acting in the best interests of the people to whom you are bound by shared fate and responsibility.
One of the great insights of conservatism is the gradient of moral concern is a good thing: I care more about my family than my community, I care more about my community than my nation, I care more about my nation than humanity. The great literature of the past takes this as given, ridicules the “globalists” as morally deficient, and deals with how a person is to make decisions in this framework. See Antigone defying her king and community to honour her badly behaved brother.
Seems arbitrary, but in practice someone who affirms equal care for all— I.E. the flat gradient — tends not do care for anyone at all. I wish I could find the paper, but Progressives tends to have less warmth of feeling toward all groups (except all of humanity) than conservatives, even their own families. But their self regard is very strong.
In short, caring globally is mostly not caring at all.
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