‘Doing good better—moral philosophy and Effective Altruism’ course syllabus.

Antonin Broi and I have been teaching a course on effective altruism at PSL (Paris Sciences et Lettres University) since September. In case some of you are interested, here is our syllabus.

Antonin is a doctor of philosophy, and I’m doing a thesis in economics, so the result is a bit of a hybrid course, with the first few weeks being devoted to philosophy and economics, and the following weeks being more cause-oriented. The last session is dedicated to group projects carried out by the students. We also felt it was important to include in our course critiques of some of the tools and concepts used by EAs (e.g. Deaton’s critique of RCTs) in order to respect academic requirements and not act as missionaries!

Please feel comfortable picking up anything that might be of interest to you.

This course is aimed at a class of about 20 third year undergraduates, and we have been asked to make the lessons quite participatory, hence our very reading-oriented format which are assessed in an interactive quiz and subsequently discussed in class.

As this is the first year we are teaching this course, it may change depending on our experience with students (or your feedback!). Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or comments.

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