Idea Machines

Effective altruism’s strength lies in its infrastructure, which we can use to better understand how other idea machines work, what their impact will be, and what’s needed to make them more effective.

By the mid-20th century, foundations had reached the height of their power and influence, triggering a congressional investigation into whether foundations were manipulating public opinion and thought. The lawyer Rene Wormser, who wrote the final report, described foundations as a “cartel” that threatened to direct our entire intellectual and cultu... See more

To those who say, “Well, wouldn’t it be better if the person with good ideas had been the one to get fabulously wealthy instead?” – sure, but in the same way that a founder wants to focus on building their company, not being an investor, sometimes “idea operator” types aren’t the same people who have eight-to-ten-figure startup outcomes. In this wo... See more

The modern Idea Machine better reflects how people self-organize today. They are decentralized, more closely intertwined with public dialogue, and work symbiotically with a community that anyone can join: many individual nodes operating in a loosely-organized network, instead of a monolithic organization.

Idea machines are not new, but the form in which they appear is changing. For most of the 20th century, the home for idea machines was foundations, first popularized by John D. Rockefeller in the 1910s.

An Idea Machine is a self-sustaining organism that contains all the parts needed to turn ideas into outcomes:- It starts with a distinct ideology, which becomes a memetic engine that drives the formation of a community- The community’s members start generating ideas amongst themselves- Eventually, they form an agenda, which articulates how the ideo... See more

Idea machines are different from movements, which are focused on achieving a specific outcome and are therefore self-limiting (if they succeed, the movement winds down). For example, YIMBYism and climate change are movements that attract operators with shared values, but on the basis of wanting to address a specific problem, rather than a philosoph... See more

If philanthropy is pluralistic – and, like any idea marketplace, that is one of its virtues – then there is no single school of thought that can “solve” complex social questions, because everyone has a different vision for the world. If you’re pro-pluralism in startups, you should also be pro-pluralism in philanthropy.

With a more decentralized structure, modern idea machines can “arm the rebels” right where they are, instead of hiring them into a foundation. The popularity of so-called regrantor programs (i.e. scout programs) reflects this trend, where talented individuals are given funding to make grants on behalf of the grantmaking organization.