In this sequence Milan Griffes explains the concept of “consequentialist cluelessness” and its implications for effective altruism. Is it possible that we don’t have a clue about the overall net impact of our actions? When we think about the consequences of our actions, how do we determine what consequences we should consider?

• The first post describes cluelessness & its relevance to EA; arguing that for many popular EA interventions we don’t have a clue about the intervention’s overall net impact.

• The second post considers a potential reply to concerns about cluelessness.

• The third post examines how tractable cluelessness is – to what extent we can grow more clueful about an intervention through intentional effort?

• The fourth post discusses how we might do good while being clueless to an important extent.