Podcasts about demandingness

2 Samuel 13 John 17 Psalm 119:81-96 Proverbs 16:6-7 Selection from Selwyn Hughes' Every Day Light: "The Cure for Demandingness" Song: Atch - Found You Music provided by Vlog No Copyright Music. Creative Commons - Attribution 3.0 Unported Video Link: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://youtu.be/G774NKvUm88⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠#NoCopyrightMusic⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠#VlogMusic⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠#VlogNoCopyrightMusic

Instagram is unparalleled in its capacity to stir up envy within us; and envy is unparalleled in its power to destroy relationships. In this episode, Cameron and Anna uncover the backbone of envy and talk about the truths from God's word that provide the corrective for our jealousy and covetousness. Resources:The Agony of Instagram by Alex WilliamsThe Envy of Eve: Finding Contentment in a Covetous World by Melissa KrugerThe Problem of Demandingness by Larry CrabbScriptures:Cain and Abel (Gen 4)Jacon and Esau (Gen 27-29)Saul and David (1 Samuel 18-31)Joseph and His Brothers (Gen 37)Korah, Dathan, and Abiram (Num. 16)The Backbone of Envy:Not recognizing and being grateful for what you have.Believing God is holding out on you.Believing that getting what you want will make you happy.Demandingness- wanting what you want RIGHT NOW!Not desiring good things to happen to other people.Not trusting in God's providence. Follow us @rootedministry!

In directing us to choose the impartially best outcome, even at significant cost to ourselves, utilitarianism can seem an incredibly demanding theory. This page explores whether this feature of utilitarianism is objectionable, and if so, how defenders of the view might best respond. The original text contained 5 footnotes which were omitted from this narration. --- First published: January 29th, 2023 Source: https://utilitarianism.net/objections-to-utilitarianism/demandingness --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

2 Samuel 13 John 17 Psalm 119:81-96 Proverbs 16:6-7 Selection from Selwyn Hughes' Every Day Light: "The Cure for Demandingness" Song: Atch - Found You Music provided by Vlog No Copyright Music. Creative Commons - Attribution 3.0 Unported Video Link: https://youtu.be/G774NKvUm88#NoCopyrightMusic #VlogMusic #VlogNoCopyrightMusic

Message from Matt Ham on May 21, 2023

Message from Mark Upton on April 16, 2023

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Seeking feedback on a MOOC draft plan: Skills for Doing Good Better, published by Michael Noetel on December 16, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. This is a Draft Amnesty Day draft. That means it's not polished, it's probably not up to my standards, the ideas are not perfect, and I haven't checked everything. I was explicitly encouraged to post something imperfect! Commenting and feedback guidelines. I'm slightly nervous about the amount of feedback I'll get on this, but am doing it because I sincerely do want constructive feedback. Please let me know if my assumptions are wrong, my plans misguided, my focus for the course poorly calibrated, or my examples un-compelling. Google Doc for commenting available upon request. A few months ago, I posted a diatribe on how to better use evidence to inform education and field building in effective altruism. This a draft where I try to practice what I preach. John Walker and I have been exploring ideas for another EA Massively Open Online Course (MOOC). This is currently Plan A. Big-picture intent Why make a MOOC? There are many great forms of outreach to build the community of people who care about effective altruism and existential risk. In contrast with most approaches, MOOCs provide: Authority, via their university affiliation Credentials for completion, with a university badge Minimal marginal cost per learner, by design Designed well, they can provide high-quality, evidence informed learning environments (e.g., with professional multimedia and interactive learning). These resources can feed into the other methods of outreach (e.g., fellowships). Course pitch to learners Many people want to do good with their lives and careers. The problem is: many well-intentioned attempts to improve the world are ineffective. Some are even harmful. With the right skills, you can have a massive impact on the world. This MOOC provides many of those skills. Through this course, you'll learn how to use your time and money to do as much good as possible, and give you a platform to keep learning about how to improve the world. Underlying assumptions To be transparent, most of these assumptions are not based on direct data from the community or general public. Where support is available, I've linked to the relevant section of resources. Where not, I've listed methods of testing those assumptions but am open to corrections or other methods. There are some skills and frameworks used in EA that help us answer the essential question: “how can I do the most good, with the resources available to me?” (see also, MacAskill) Examples of what we mean by ‘skills and frameworks' current CEA website: scope sensitivity, trade-offs, scout mindset, impartiality, (less confidently: expected value, thinking on the margin, consequentialism, importance/value of unusual ideas, INT framework, crucial considerations, forecasting, and fermi estimates See old whatiseffectivealtruism.com page: maximisation, rationality, cosmopolitanism, cost-effectiveness, cause neutrality, counterfactual reasoning These skills and frameworks are less ‘double-edged' than the moral philosophy The moral obligations in EA (e.g., Singer's drowning child) are a source of motivation for many but also a source of burnout and distress (see also forum tags on Demandingness of morality and Excited vs. obligatory altruism) In contrast, the evidence that ‘improving competence and confidence leads to sustainable motivation' is supported by dozens of meta-analyses across domains with no major downsides, to my knowledge These skills and frameworks are less controversial than the ‘answers' (e.g., existential risk, farmed animal welfare) As put by CEA, “we are more confident in the core principles” Misconceptions about EA (e.g., per 80k: ‘EA is just about fighting poverty'; ‘EA ignores systemic chan...

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Demandingness and Time/Money Tradeoffs are Orthogonal, published by CarolineEllison on May 5, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. Recently there has been a spate of discussion on the EA Forum and elsewhere about increased spending in EA and its potential negative consequences. There are various potential concerns one might have about this, and addressing all of them would require a much longer discussion. But it seems like one common worry is something like: Having a frugal EA movement has positive selection effects. Living frugally is a costly signal. This ensures people will only want to join if they're very altruistically motivated. Conversely, spending more on community building, EA salaries, etc has negative selection effects. It will attract people who are primarily motivated by money rather than altruism. I think this argument conflates two separate questions: How demanding should EA be? How should we value EA time compared to money? These two questions seem totally separable to me. For instance, say A works at an EA org. His work produces $500/hour of value. He gets paid $50/hour by his employer. He has a fraudulent charge of $100 on a card that he could dispute. This requires him to spend 1 hour on the phone with customer service. He is indifferent between this and spending an hour doing a relatively unpleasant work task. As things currently stand, he might spend the hour to recover the $100. But I think it would clearly be better if someone paid him $100 to spend an hour doing the unpleasant work task for his organization rather than trying to recover the money. It would keep his utility (and thus demandingness) constant, while resulting in $400 of surplus value created. I think in the current EA movement: I feel unsure about whether it would be better to increase or decrease demandingness. It seems like a tough tradeoff. Increasing demandingness pushes people to do and sacrifice more, as well as selecting for altruistically motivated people. On the other hand, it may exclude people who could make valuable contributions but aren't as dedicated, as well as leading to demotivation and burnout. I do think it would be better to increase the monetary value we assign to the time of people doing EA work on average. Given the current stock of funding vs human capital in EA, I think the time of the highest performing EAs is worth a lot. I suspect the current artificially low salaries in EA often lead to people making inefficient time/money tradeoffs. I think many people have an intuitive worry that paying EAs more will cause EA to lose its edge. Initially EA was a scrappy movement of people who really cared, and they worry that giving people more money will make it soft and cushy. I'm sympathetic to that, but I think there are a lot of ways EA can be demanding that don't rely on frugality. We could expect EAs to: work 7 days a week prioritize work over socializing or hobbies work long hours and be constantly available/responsive outside work hours leave a fun and/or high-status job for an unpleasant and/or low-status one do job tasks that are valuable even if they're ones they don't enjoy move to a location they don't like for work prioritize their impact over relationships with family, friends, romantic partners, or children admit when they were wrong even if it's painful train skills they think are valuable even if it feels unnatural and hard act in a way that represents EA well, even if they'd rather be petty and uncharitable practice the virtue of silence There are probably many other things I'm not thinking of here that are both demanding and potentially quite valuable. Many of the most effective EAs I know have done and continue to do a bunch of these things, and I think they're pretty awesome and hardcore for doing so. I think these are all more efficient c...

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Increasing Demandingness in EA, published by jefftk on April 29, 2022 on LessWrong. In thinking about what it means to lead a good life, people often struggle with the question of how much is enough: how much does our morality demand of us? People have given a wide range of answers to this question, but effective altruism has historically used "giving 10%". Yes, it's better if you donate a larger fraction, switch to a job where you can earn more, or put your career to use directly, but if you're giving 10% to effective charity you're doing your share, you've met the bar to consider yourself an EA, and we're happy to have you on board. I say "historically", because it feels like this is changing; I think EAs would generally still agree with my paragraph above, but while in 2014 it would have been uncontroversial now I think some would disagree and others would have to think for a while. EA started out as a funding-constrained movement. Whether you looked at global poverty, existential risk, animal advocacy, or movement building, many excellent people were working as volunteers or well below what they could earn because there just wasn't the money to offer competitive pay. Every year GiveWell's total room for more funding was a multiple of their money moved. In this environment, the importance of donations was clear. EA has been pretty successful in raising money, however, and the primary constraint has shifted from money to people. In 2015, 80k made a strong case for focusing on what people can do directly, not mediated by donations, and this case is even stronger today. Personally, I've found this pretty convincing, though in 2017 I decided to return to earning to give because it still seemed like the best fit for me. What this means, however, is that we are now trying to build a different sort of movement than we were ten years ago. While people who've dedicated their careers toward the most critical things have made up the core of the movement all along, the ratio of impact has changed. Imagine you have a group of people donating 10% to the typical mix of EA causes. You are given the option to convince one of them to start working on one of 80k's priority areas, but in doing so N others will get discouraged and stop donating. This is a bit of a false dilemma, since ideally these would not be in conflict, but let's stick with this for a bit because I think it is illustrative. In 2012 I would have put a pretty low number for N, perhaps ~3, partly because we were low on money, but also because we were starting a movement. In 2015 I would have put N at ~30: a factor of 6 because of the difference between 10% and the most that people in typical earning to give roles can generally donate (~60%) and a factor of 5 because of the considerations in Why you should focus more on talent gaps, not funding gaps. With the large recent increases in EA-influenced spending I'd roughly put N at ~300 [1], though I'd be interested in better estimates. Unfortunately, a norm of "10% and you're doing your part" combines very poorly with the reality of 100% of someone's career having ~300x more impact than 10%. This makes EA feel much more demanding than it used to: instead of saying "look at the impact you can have by donating 10%", we're now generally saying "look at the impact you can have by building your entire career around work on an important problem." (This has not applied evenly. People who were already planning to make EA central to their career are generally experiencing EA as less demanding: pay in EA organizations has gone up, there is less stress around fundraising, and there is less of a focus on frugality or other forms of personal sacrifice. In some cases these changes mean that if someone does decide to shift their career it is less of a sacrifice than it would've been, t...

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Increasing Demandingness in EA, published by jefftk on April 29, 2022 on LessWrong. In thinking about what it means to lead a good life, people often struggle with the question of how much is enough: how much does our morality demand of us? People have given a wide range of answers to this question, but effective altruism has historically used "giving 10%". Yes, it's better if you donate a larger fraction, switch to a job where you can earn more, or put your career to use directly, but if you're giving 10% to effective charity you're doing your share, you've met the bar to consider yourself an EA, and we're happy to have you on board. I say "historically", because it feels like this is changing; I think EAs would generally still agree with my paragraph above, but while in 2014 it would have been uncontroversial now I think some would disagree and others would have to think for a while. EA started out as a funding-constrained movement. Whether you looked at global poverty, existential risk, animal advocacy, or movement building, many excellent people were working as volunteers or well below what they could earn because there just wasn't the money to offer competitive pay. Every year GiveWell's total room for more funding was a multiple of their money moved. In this environment, the importance of donations was clear. EA has been pretty successful in raising money, however, and the primary constraint has shifted from money to people. In 2015, 80k made a strong case for focusing on what people can do directly, not mediated by donations, and this case is even stronger today. Personally, I've found this pretty convincing, though in 2017 I decided to return to earning to give because it still seemed like the best fit for me. What this means, however, is that we are now trying to build a different sort of movement than we were ten years ago. While people who've dedicated their careers toward the most critical things have made up the core of the movement all along, the ratio of impact has changed. Imagine you have a group of people donating 10% to the typical mix of EA causes. You are given the option to convince one of them to start working on one of 80k's priority areas, but in doing so N others will get discouraged and stop donating. This is a bit of a false dilemma, since ideally these would not be in conflict, but let's stick with this for a bit because I think it is illustrative. In 2012 I would have put a pretty low number for N, perhaps ~3, partly because we were low on money, but also because we were starting a movement. In 2015 I would have put N at ~30: a factor of 6 because of the difference between 10% and the most that people in typical earning to give roles can generally donate (~60%) and a factor of 5 because of the considerations in Why you should focus more on talent gaps, not funding gaps. With the large recent increases in EA-influenced spending I'd roughly put N at ~300 [1], though I'd be interested in better estimates. Unfortunately, a norm of "10% and you're doing your part" combines very poorly with the reality of 100% of someone's career having ~300x more impact than 10%. This makes EA feel much more demanding than it used to: instead of saying "look at the impact you can have by donating 10%", we're now generally saying "look at the impact you can have by building your entire career around work on an important problem." (This has not applied evenly. People who were already planning to make EA central to their career are generally experiencing EA as less demanding: pay in EA organizations has gone up, there is less stress around fundraising, and there is less of a focus on frugality or other forms of personal sacrifice. In some cases these changes mean that if someone does decide to shift their career it is less of a sacrifice than it would've been, t...

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Increasing Demandingness in EA, published by jefftk on April 29, 2022 on LessWrong. In thinking about what it means to lead a good life, people often struggle with the question of how much is enough: how much does our morality demand of us? People have given a wide range of answers to this question, but effective altruism has historically used "giving 10%". Yes, it's better if you donate a larger fraction, switch to a job where you can earn more, or put your career to use directly, but if you're giving 10% to effective charity you're doing your share, you've met the bar to consider yourself an EA, and we're happy to have you on board. I say "historically", because it feels like this is changing; I think EAs would generally still agree with my paragraph above, but while in 2014 it would have been uncontroversial now I think some would disagree and others would have to think for a while. EA started out as a funding-constrained movement. Whether you looked at global poverty, existential risk, animal advocacy, or movement building, many excellent people were working as volunteers or well below what they could earn because there just wasn't the money to offer competitive pay. Every year GiveWell's total room for more funding was a multiple of their money moved. In this environment, the importance of donations was clear. EA has been pretty successful in raising money, however, and the primary constraint has shifted from money to people. In 2015, 80k made a strong case for focusing on what people can do directly, not mediated by donations, and this case is even stronger today. Personally, I've found this pretty convincing, though in 2017 I decided to return to earning to give because it still seemed like the best fit for me. What this means, however, is that we are now trying to build a different sort of movement than we were ten years ago. While people who've dedicated their careers toward the most critical things have made up the core of the movement all along, the ratio of impact has changed. Imagine you have a group of people donating 10% to the typical mix of EA causes. You are given the option to convince one of them to start working on one of 80k's priority areas, but in doing so N others will get discouraged and stop donating. This is a bit of a false dilemma, since ideally these would not be in conflict, but let's stick with this for a bit because I think it is illustrative. In 2012 I would have put a pretty low number for N, perhaps ~3, partly because we were low on money, but also because we were starting a movement. In 2015 I would have put N at ~30: a factor of 6 because of the difference between 10% and the most that people in typical earning to give roles can generally donate (~60%) and a factor of 5 because of the considerations in Why you should focus more on talent gaps, not funding gaps. With the large recent increases in EA-influenced spending I'd roughly put N at ~300 [1], though I'd be interested in better estimates. Unfortunately, a norm of "10% and you're doing your part" combines very poorly with the reality of 100% of someone's career having ~300x more impact than 10%. This makes EA feel much more demanding than it used to: instead of saying "look at the impact you can have by donating 10%", we're now generally saying "look at the impact you can have by building your entire career around work on an important problem." (This has not applied evenly. People who were already planning to make EA central to their career are generally experiencing EA as less demanding: pay in EA organizations has gone up, there is less stress around fundraising, and there is less of a focus on frugality or other forms of personal sacrifice. In some cases these changes mean that if someone does decide to shift their career it is less of a sacrifice than it would've been, t...

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Increasing Demandingness in EA, published by Jeff Kaufman on April 29, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. In thinking about what it means to lead a good life, people often struggle with the question of how much is enough: how much does our morality demand of us? People have given a wide range of answers to this question, but effective altruism has historically used "giving 10%". Yes, it's better if you donate a larger fraction, switch to a job where you can earn more, or put your career to use directly, but if you're giving 10% to effective charity you're doing your share, you've met the bar to consider yourself an EA, and we're happy to have you on board. I say "historically", because it feels like this is changing; I think EAs would generally still agree with my paragraph above, but while in 2014 it would have been uncontroversial now I think some would disagree and others would have to think for a while. EA started out as a funding-constrained movement. Whether you looked at global poverty, existential risk, animal advocacy, or movement building, many excellent people were working as volunteers or well below what they could earn because there just wasn't the money to offer competitive pay. Every year GiveWell's total room for more funding was a multiple of their money moved. In this environment, the importance of donations was clear. EA has been pretty successful in raising money, however, and the primary constraint has shifted from money to people. In 2015, 80k made a strong case for focusing on what people can do directly, not mediated by donations, and this case is even stronger today. Personally, I've found this pretty convincing, though in 2017 I decided to return to earning to give because it still seemed like the best fit for me. What this means, however, is that we are now trying to build a different sort of movement than we were ten years ago. While people who've dedicated their careers toward the most critical things have made up the core of the movement all along, the ratio of impact has changed. Imagine you have a group of people donating 10% to the typical mix of EA causes. You are given the option to convince one of them to start working on one of 80k's priority areas, but in doing so N others will get discouraged and stop donating. This is a bit of a false dilemma, since ideally these would not be in conflict, but let's stick with this for a bit because I think it is illustrative. In 2012 I would have put a pretty low number for N, perhaps ~3, partly because we were low on money, but also because we were starting a movement. In 2015 I would have put N at ~30: a factor of 6 because of the difference between 10% and the most that people in typical earning to give roles can generally donate (~60%) and a factor of 5 because of the considerations in Why you should focus more on talent gaps, not funding gaps. With the large recent increases in EA-influenced spending I'd roughly put N at ~300 [1], though I'd be interested in better estimates. Unfortunately, a norm of "10% and you're doing your part" combines very poorly with the reality of 100% of someone's career having ~300x more impact than 10%. This makes EA feel much more demanding than it used to: instead of saying "look at the impact you can have by donating 10%", we're now generally saying "look at the impact you can have by building your entire career around work on an important problem." (This has not applied evenly. People who were already planning to make EA central to their career are generally experiencing EA as less demanding: pay in EA organizations has gone up, there is less stress around fundraising, and there is less of a focus on frugality or other forms of personal sacrifice. In some cases these changes mean that if someone does decide to shift their career it is less of a sacrifice...

Sometimes our faith is bold and we feel we can handle anything. But all too often we feel like we are just hanging on. It is in the times of darkness that we tend to cry out and demand God to come through. We will discover that God is patient with us and that the […] The post Clinging to Faith: Faith and Demandingness in Job appeared first on PLEASANT HILL COMMUNITY CHURCH.

When people irritate us it often reveals more about us than them. Listen in to learn how to figure this out, and then and what to do about it. Hello everyone and welcome to episode 95. Before we get into today’s topic I have two listener responses I thought you’d be interested in. The first is from a retired missionary in response to episode 87. This was about a New Year’s resolution to receive thank you notes in the mail from people who appreciate something about you. A written expression of gratitude is the obvious result of doing something meaningful for someone, which is the point of making this resolution - not the note itself [ read the thank you card from V.] And here’s an email I received from Patty, another listener to our podcast. She wrote: “I received a beautiful thank you note from my snowbird neighbors thanking me for picking up their mail all winter long.  I also sent a thank you card to a friend who hosted & invited me to a delicious luncheon. It's the little Thank You's that mean so much.  Thx for reviving this 'thank you' trend” I’d like to know how this thank you note idea is going for the rest of you. Please let me know. Well, on to today’s show. I’m going to assume that you, like me, every now and then run into frustrating and irritating situations. Today’s episode is about an effective way I’m learning to deal with these unwelcome moments. It’s taken me years to discover this principle that helps when people irritate us. I’m going to share it with you so that you can learn from my mistakes and live a less frustrating life. What prompted me to bring this up is last week’s episode, no 94, Self-Awareness Deepens Our Relationships Last week's episode The tires on my car needed air Pulled into the lot of a convenience store that offered free air from their tire pump. A big van, with a disabled sticker on the license plate, pulled in just ahead of me at the air pump. I’m going to have to wait my turn An older lady gets out with a 3-pronged cane, walking very slowly. Has difficulty getting the air pump nozzle onto the tire valve. Irritation rose within me because it was now going to take a lot longer to accomplish my goal of getting air in my own tires I get out to speed the process up, not out of any great sense of compassion for this lady. It was 6 degrees and my hands were freezing. The point of that episode, and I’ll have a link to it in the show notes, is this: We will have deeper relationships with others to the extent we are self-aware and then act on that self-awareness in a Godly manner. It raises the question, though of “how do I become more self-aware in irritating and frustrating situations like this, when people irritate me?” The answer is found in adapting the principle found in Psalm 4:4 Now, I wasn’t angry with the lady, rather more frustrated or irritated that her behavior was getting in the way of what I wanted. But the principle found in Psalm 4:4 works just as well in situations as I described. This verse is in the context of vs. 2, where David talks about the people who are spreading lies about him and ruining his reputation. Here’s what he says to do in response to this injustice: Psalm 4:4, in various versions Don’t sin by letting anger control you. Think about it overnight and remain silent. Interlude NLT Tremble and do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent. NIV Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. Selah ESV Be angry, and do not sin. Meditate within your heart on your bed, and be still. Selah NKJV Tremble, and do not sin; Meditate in your heart upon your bed, and be still. Selah. NASB What are we to think about, to meditate on, to tremble over? Answer:  What is going on within us that is causing the anger, frustration, or irritation.? It’s not just the obvious stuff. It’s what’s going on in our heart below the surface where the problem, and the solution, lie. Once we have a name for what’s going on inside, it becomes easier to deal with. This verse is about anger, but irritation and frustration, are the misbehaving step-children of Anger. It teaches us what we can do when people irritate us. And anger as we know is a surface emotion. It covers what’s going on below the surface: either fear - hurt - sadness - or demanding-ness. I’ll talk more about this in a later episode when we examine in more detail anger and its effect on our relationships. With the old lady, I wasn’t hurt, or sad. But I was a bit anxious over the other guy who had pulled up, and mildly concerned about frostbite to my hands. I was more anxious that I wasn’t going to be able to get done all that I wanted to that morning. On the surface, it may have appeared my frustration was directed at her personally, but the more I thought about it, my frustration was directed at my circumstances and demanding-ness that I accomplish what I want to accomplish WHEN I want to accomplish the items on my to-do list. It took me a while to realize this. Maybe hours. The Holy Spirit seemed to be speaking to me. Lighten up, guy. After all, she has a double-amputee husband sitting in the car is of no help to her at all. He reminded me that since the dawn of creation, 99% of the time things ALWAYS take longer than you think, so don’t be surprised that your day is going slower than you had hoped. Lower your expectations. It's so helpful to remember this when people irritate us. Applying Psalm 4:4 to other people So I’m learning to apply Psalm 4:4 to my anger, and frustrations. But it also helps in relating with others When I see another person who is frustrated or angry, I’ll wonder what they are worried about. What they might be fearing. Or what they’re sad about that comes out in frustration or anger. Psalm 4:4 and children Psalm 4:4 is also helpful in raising and understanding children. Displays of anger in kids are often because they’re afraid of something. They fear their need for something will go unmet for the rest of their lives. “My sister is playing with the stuffed animal we share, and my turn will never never ever ever come. “ Demandingness, certainly is part of childhood anger. Because of their development, they don’t have words to express their fear, their hurt, or their sadness. So these emotions come out as anger. So what does all this mean for YOU? How can you apply what we’ve considered in this episode to YOUR life? Here are a few ideas When people irritate you, take a self-imposed time-out and ask God to help you question yourself. Do what King David said: Be angry, and do not sin; ponder in your own hearts on your beds, and be silent. Selah ESV One other question you can ask yourself is “Does this person or situation remind me of someone or something else? A few months ago a friend was talking in a group about an irritating person, and as the group explored more with her as to WHY this person was irritating, she came to the realization that the irritating person reminded her of her mother. This self-examination that we find in Psalm 4: 4 will deepen our relationship with God, ourselves, and other people. If you forget everything else, here’s the one thing I hope you remember from today’s episode. When people irritate us, stop and ask ourselves why is this person bothering me so much? What is my irritation revealing about ME? I’d love to hear any thoughts you have about today’s episode. Just send them to me in an email to john@caringforothers.org. I may share them in a future episode unless you say otherwise. You can also share your thoughts in the “Leave a Reply” box at the bottom of the show notes. Related episodes that might interest you 094 Self-Awareness Deepens Our Relationships 020 Relating with People Who Talk Too Much Closing In closing, if you found the podcast helpful, please subscribe and I’d appreciate it if you would leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts. It will help us to serve more people just like you. I hope your thinking was stimulated by today’s show, to both reflect and to act. So that you will find the joy God intends for you through your relationships. Because after all, You Were Made for This. Well, that’s all for today. See you next week. Goodbye for now. You Were Made for This is sponsored by Caring for Others, a missionary care ministry. We depend upon the generosity of donors to pay our bills.  If you'd like to support what we do with a secure tax-deductible donation, please click here. We'd be so grateful if you did.

This episode is all about the pros & cons around the belief of demandinessness. Things like, what is the value of blaming others? Is entitlement a good thing? What about the idea of needing to be right and speaking your truths. We will unpack these ideas, and discuss if they are helping or hurting you.

Today's bonus episode of the podcast is a quick conversation between me and my fellow 80,000 Hours researcher Arden Koehler about a few topics, including the demandingness of morality, work-life balance, and emotional reactions to injustice. Arden is about to graduate with a philosophy PhD from New York University, so naturally we dive right into some challenging implications of utilitarian philosophy and how it might be applied to real life. Issues we talk about include: • If you’re not going to be completely moral, should you try being a bit more ethical, or give up? • Should you feel angry if you see an injustice, and if so, why? • How much should we ask people to live frugally? So far the feedback on the post-episode chats that we've done have been positive, so we thought we'd go ahead and try out this freestanding one. But fair warning: it's among the more difficult episodes to follow, and probably not the best one to listen to first, as you'll benefit from having more context! If you'd like to listen to more of Arden you can find her in episode 67, David Chalmers on the nature and ethics of consciousness, or episode 66, Peter Singer on being provocative, EA, and how his moral views have changed. Here's more information on some of the issues we touch on: • Consequentialism on Wikipedia • Appropriate dispositions on the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy • Demandingness objection on Wikipedia • And a paper on epistemic normativity. ——— I mention the call for papers of the Academic Workshop on Global Priorities in the introduction — you can learn more here. And finally, Toby Ord — one of our founding Trustees and a Senior Research Fellow in Philosophy at Oxford University — has his new book The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity coming out next week. I've read it and very much enjoyed it. Find out where you can pre-order it here. We'll have an interview with him coming up soon.

Guest: Evan Sandhoefner (blogger, Effective Altruist, and alum of Microsoft & Harvard) Book: Famine, Affluence, and Morality by Peter Singer Booze: Ballast Point Sculpin IPA 0:00:00 - Evan and Ballast Point Sculpin https://sandhoefner.com/ https://twitter.com/EvanSandhoefner?lang=en 0:03:49 - Brian Tomasik, who inspired Evan’s website https://briantomasik.com/ https://reducing-suffering.org/ 0:05:21 - How does Evan handle discussing ethics without sounding like a dick? 0:08:00 - Famine, Affluence, and Morality and the Effective Altruism movement https://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1972----.htm https://www.ted.com/talks/peter_singer_the_why_and_how_of_effective_altruism?language=en https://www.centreforeffectivealtruism.org/blog/understanding-cause-neutrality/ 0:17:42 - Direct work vs Working to Give https://80000hours.org/articles/earning-to-give/ https://80000hours.org/career-guide/ https://80000hours.org/2015/07/80000-hours-thinks-that-only-a-small-proportion-of-people-should-earn-to-give-long-term/ 0:26:28 - The Most Effective Cocaine Dealer https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/3DGYg2RxXHgekLGeG/to-save-the-world-don-t-get-a-job-at-a-charity-go-work-on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trolley_problem 0:30:57 - Utilitarian calculus: Quantifying fuzzy concepts like suffering, happiness, well-being, etc. 0:33:09 - Consciousness, consciousness meters, and aliens https://www.iep.utm.edu/hard-con/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speciesism https://waitbutwhy.com/2014/05/fermi-paradox.html 0:42:19 - Moral tug-of-war: The demandingness objection to utilitarianism and Effective Altruism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demandingness_objection 0:49:53 - Bugs in our brains: Grappling with our flawed moral minds https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/how-risky-is-it-really/201108/statistical-numbing-why-millions-can-die-and-we-don-t-care https://fs.blog/2017/05/confirmation-bias/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-group_favoritism https://www.theverge.com/2017/3/27/15077864/elon-musk-neuralink-brain-computer-interface-ai-cyborgs 0:56:58 - Is ethics self-limiting? Can ethical people be successful? 1:02:11 - Self-deception, and The Elephant in the Brain by Robin Hanson and Kevin Simler https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-serving_bias https://www.amazon.com/Elephant-Brain-Hidden-Motives-Everyday/dp/0190495995 1:03:56 - Wild animal suffering, selection theory, and cats wearing bells https://reducing-suffering.org/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R/K_selection_theory https://www.birdsbesafe.com/ 1:17:57 - Domestic animal suffering, unhappy cows, and reducing vs eliminating meat from your diet https://animalcharityevaluators.org/ https://www.givewell.org/ 1:26:53 - Existential risk and the “expected value” of the far future https://concepts.effectivealtruism.org/concepts/existential-risks/ https://concepts.effectivealtruism.org/concepts/the-long-term-future/ https://www.effectivealtruism.org/articles/ea-global-2018-far-future-of-life/ 1:30:42 - Epic Givewell spreadsheet https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xBKlshqbu6H-uByB2INEaDNPpj_Ulz0WrrFwgrnkXfk/edit#gid=1537947274 1:31:59 - Open philanthropy, hit-based giving, and The Man Who Fed the World https://www.openphilanthropy.org/blog/hits-based-giving https://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Fed-World-Laureate/dp/1930754906 1:41:04 - Slow vs fast Artificial intelligence, giving now vs giving later, the time value of money, and John’s personal reasons for (mostly) giving later https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/7uJcBNZhinomKtH9p/giving-now-vs-later-a-summary https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/timevalueofmoney.asp https://fs.blog/2013/02/the-psychology-of-human-misjudgement/ 1:53:01 - Effective Altruism’s “popularity problem”, growing the movement, and caring vs counting https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/pcygusgiy6ZabnB93/how-valuable-is-movement-growth 2:06:10 - An opportunity to be a real superhero

It’s happening to all of us at some point or another in our lives “We keep circling the emotional drain”. What is THINK-FEEL-DO thermostat and the connections between your thoughts, feelings and actions. Let’s connect the dots. DEMANDINGNESS is the first and most important type of irrational thinking identified by Dr. Ellis. When irrational thinking is recognized it equates with AWFULIZING, CAN'T STAND IT-ITIS, and LABELING AND DAMNING. None of which serves your purpose or happiness. Now, that you know and understand what got you where you are the question is how do you correct your irrational thinking? Ray Mathis taught health education for 33 years. To do that job better, he became certified in Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy (REBT). He developed a new approach to health and wellness “The Mental and Emotional Tool Kit for Life". Ray represents the non-profit Chicago Institute for Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy (and Education). He speaks to schools, universities, groups, businesses, and at state and national conventions for teachers, school counselors and mental health professionals about taking his "tool kit" approach to mental health, health, social, behavioral, academic and other societal problems. Further insights: Ray Mathis:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/ray-mathis-a8a61a10/ Control Issues:  http://www.monikahoyt.com/relationship-control-issues/ Shame-Based Issues:  https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/intense-emotions-and-strong-feelings/201104/shame-concealed-contagious-and-dangerous-emotion How Distorted Thinking Increases Stress and Anxiety:  https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/turning-straw-gold/201409/how-distorted-thinking-increases-stress-and-anxiety?collection=166710

Fiona Woollard is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Southampton. She works in normative and applied ethics, the philosophy of sex and the philosophy of pregnancy and motherhood. In her first book, Doing and Allowing Harm (Oxford, 2015), she argues that constraints against doing harm and permissions to allow harm are necessary for anything to belong to a person, even that person’s body. She also defends a ‘moderate’ account of requirements to prevent harm to others. This podcast is an audio recording of Dr. Woollard's talk - 'Dimensions of Demandingness' - at the Aristotelian Society on 30 November 2015. The recording was produced by Backdoor Broadcasting Company.

Paper given by Alice Pinheiro Walla (Trinity College, Dublin). This paper addresses problems arising from Kant’s distinction between perfect and imperfect duties. Firstly, I discuss the intuition that imperfect duties are able to “trump” perfect ones under certain circumstances. If this intuition is correct, Kant’s distinction between perfect and imperfect duties seems irrelevant, since it is not the logical structure of the duty that tells us what is to be done under the circumstances. Further, if this intuition is correct, there is the also the worry that beneficence may be far more demanding than Kant himself realized. I also mention the “tragic side” of Kant’s moral theory, which does not exclude the possibility of agents having to sacrifice their happiness for the sake of morality. I offer possible ways to address these problems compatible with Kant’s theory.

Paper given by Brian McElwee (University of St. Andrews). Moral theories are frequently rejected on the basis that they are too demanding. I aim to establish what structure convincing demandingness objections must have. Firstly, demandingness objections apply to a theory not primarily in virtue of its ranking of actions, but in virtue of its account of moral requirement. This suggests that theories with consequentialist rankings need not be any more vulnerable to demandingness objections than other plausible moral theories. Secondly, I consider the role that an appeal to cost should have in demandingness objections. I argue that the claim must be understood as an appeal to the costs that the theory calls on moral agents (as opposed to ‘patients’, those affected by the behaviour which the moral theory assesses) to bear. I argue that a plausible account of moral demands must take account of (a) the spontaneous verdicts of our reactive attitudes to agents and (b) typical levels of altruistic motivation.