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Philos­o­phy of effec­tive altruism

TagLast edit: May 30, 2022, 2:46 PM by Leo

The Philosophy of effective altruism tag covers posts about the philosophical ideas behind EA, especially when they don’t discuss particular causes or research methods.

Further reading

MacAskill, William & Darius Meissner (2020) Effective altruism, in ‘Acting on utilitarianism’, Utilitarianism.

Related entries

philosophy

Really rad­i­cal empathy

MichaelStJulesJan 6, 2025, 5:46 PM
30 points
3 comments10 min readEA link

Utili­tar­i­anism and the re­place­abil­ity of de­sires and attachments

MichaelStJulesJul 27, 2024, 1:57 AM
34 points
13 comments12 min readEA link

A philo­soph­i­cal re­view of Open Philan­thropy’s Cause Pri­ori­ti­sa­tion Framework

MichaelPlantJul 15, 2022, 8:21 AM
160 points
11 comments29 min readEA link
(www.happierlivesinstitute.org)

Prob­a­bil­ities, Pri­ori­ti­za­tion, and ‘Bayesian Mind­set’

Violet HourApr 4, 2023, 10:16 AM
70 points
6 comments24 min readEA link

Why not give 90%?

HaydenWMar 23, 2020, 2:53 AM
57 points
26 comments7 min readEA link

Non-util­i­tar­ian effec­tive altruism

keir bradwellJan 29, 2023, 6:07 AM
42 points
10 comments17 min readEA link
(keirbradwell.substack.com)

A Stranger Pri­or­ity? Topics at the Outer Reaches of Effec­tive Altru­ism (my dis­ser­ta­tion)

Joe_CarlsmithFeb 21, 2023, 5:16 PM
64 points
0 comments1 min readEA link

Ex­pected value the­ory is fa­nat­i­cal, but that’s a good thing

HaydenWSep 21, 2020, 8:48 AM
57 points
20 comments5 min readEA link

On “fringe” ideas

Kelsey PiperAug 19, 2019, 7:00 AM
259 points
6 comments5 min readEA link
(theunitofcaring.tumblr.com)

Effec­tive Altru­ism is a Ques­tion (not an ide­ol­ogy)

HelenOct 16, 2014, 4:16 AM
282 points
48 comments4 min readEA link

Aim high, even if you fall short

Julia_Wise🔸Oct 11, 2014, 5:26 PM
151 points
11 comments2 min readEA link

Dist­in­guish­ing be­tween the “philos­o­phy of EA” and the “EA com­mu­nity” to pro­mote effec­tive outreach

Kat BiewerApr 7, 2023, 3:38 AM
27 points
0 comments2 min readEA link

Hedg­ing against deep and moral uncertainty

MichaelStJulesSep 12, 2020, 11:44 PM
83 points
13 comments9 min readEA link

New book: Mo­ral Uncer­tainty by MacAskill, Ord & Bykvist

frankieawSep 10, 2020, 4:22 PM
91 points
2 comments1 min readEA link

In defence of epistemic mod­esty [dis­til­la­tion]

LuiseMay 10, 2023, 9:39 AM
26 points
3 comments9 min readEA link

Defin­ing Effec­tive Altruism

William_MacAskillJul 19, 2019, 10:49 AM
112 points
22 comments5 min readEA link

“Do­ing Good Best” isn’t the EA ideal

DavidmanheimSep 16, 2022, 12:06 PM
128 points
17 comments6 min readEA link

Philos­o­phy Web—Pro­ject Pro­posal

Ben EvansAug 24, 2021, 3:37 PM
9 points
2 comments3 min readEA link

[Question] What are the key on­go­ing de­bates in EA?

richard_ngoMar 8, 2020, 4:12 PM
74 points
54 comments1 min readEA link

Cause pri­ori­ti­za­tion for down­side-fo­cused value systems

Lukas_GloorJan 31, 2018, 2:47 PM
76 points
11 comments48 min readEA link

The Priv­ilege of Earn­ing To Give

Jeff Kaufman 🔸Jan 14, 2015, 1:59 AM
96 points
38 comments1 min readEA link

[Question] Is the cur­rent defi­ni­tion of EA not rep­re­sen­ta­tive of hits-based giv­ing?

VenkateshApr 26, 2021, 4:37 AM
44 points
14 comments1 min readEA link

The most im­por­tant un­solved prob­lems in ethics

William_MacAskillOct 15, 2012, 2:28 AM
16 points
0 comments2 min readEA link

On ev­ery­day al­tru­ism and the lo­cal circle

Bernadette_YoungMay 24, 2015, 2:09 PM
36 points
9 comments1 min readEA link

Con­sid­er­ing Con­sid­er­ate­ness: Why com­mu­ni­ties of do-good­ers should be ex­cep­tion­ally considerate

Stefan_SchubertMay 31, 2017, 10:41 PM
58 points
15 comments1 min readEA link

Giv­ing isn’t de­mand­ing*

William_MacAskillNov 25, 2011, 5:00 AM
22 points
3 comments2 min readEA link

Effec­tive Altru­ism’s Im­plicit Epistemology

Violet HourOct 18, 2022, 1:38 PM
129 points
12 comments28 min readEA link

A philo­soph­i­cal in­tro­duc­tion to effec­tive altruism

William_MacAskillJul 10, 2019, 1:40 PM
56 points
8 comments1 min readEA link

If you want to dis­agree with effec­tive al­tru­ism, you need to dis­agree one of these three claims

Benjamin_ToddSep 25, 2016, 3:01 PM
31 points
7 comments7 min readEA link

The Harsanyi-Rawls de­bate: poli­ti­cal philos­o­phy as de­ci­sion the­ory un­der uncertainty

RamiroAug 1, 2021, 2:04 PM
19 points
3 comments4 min readEA link

Act util­i­tar­i­anism: crite­rion of right­ness vs. de­ci­sion procedure

AskellJan 18, 2017, 11:49 PM
61 points
5 comments4 min readEA link

Cosmopolitanism

TopherHallquistSep 10, 2014, 7:30 AM
47 points
40 comments5 min readEA link

Sum­mary of my aca­demic pa­per “Effec­tive Altru­ism and Sys­temic Change”

antonin_broiSep 26, 2019, 1:55 PM
82 points
5 comments4 min readEA link

What ac­tu­ally is the ar­gu­ment for effec­tive al­tru­ism?

Benjamin_ToddSep 26, 2020, 8:32 PM
98 points
29 comments2 min readEA link

Effi­cient char­ity: do unto oth­ers...

Scott AlexanderSep 3, 2013, 4:40 AM
83 points
13 comments6 min readEA link

Ste­fan Schu­bert: Un­der­stand­ing cause-neutrality

EA GlobalNov 3, 2017, 7:43 AM
12 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

GiveWell’s Char­ity Recom­men­da­tions Re­quire Tak­ing a Con­tro­ver­sial Stance on Pop­u­la­tion Ethics

MichaelDickensMay 17, 2016, 1:51 AM
30 points
52 comments8 min readEA link

Toby Ord: Selected quo­ta­tions on ex­is­ten­tial risk

Aaron Gertler 🔸Aug 6, 2020, 5:41 PM
32 points
0 comments39 min readEA link
(theprecipice.com)

EA read­ing list: clue­less­ness and epistemic modesty

richard_ngoAug 3, 2020, 9:23 AM
29 points
3 comments1 min readEA link

What al­tru­ism means to me

Neel NandaAug 15, 2020, 8:25 AM
14 points
0 comments7 min readEA link
(www.neelnanda.io)

Prospect­ing for Gold (Owen Cot­ton-Bar­ratt)

EA GlobalNov 18, 2016, 12:11 PM
44 points
5 comments21 min readEA link

Effec­tive Altru­ism is an Ide­ol­ogy, not (just) a Question

James FodorJun 28, 2019, 7:18 AM
166 points
46 comments16 min readEA link
(thegodlesstheist.com)

Why I’m skep­ti­cal about un­proven causes (and you should be too)

Peter WildefordAug 7, 2013, 4:00 AM
54 points
1 comment11 min readEA link

An em­bar­rass­ment of riches

Julia_Wise🔸Nov 19, 2015, 6:23 PM
55 points
3 comments5 min readEA link

Effec­tive Altru­ism and Mean­ing in Life

extra_ordinaryMar 18, 2019, 6:12 AM
106 points
7 comments12 min readEA link

Philos­o­phy event se­ries in­tro­duc­ing EA at the Univer­sity of Zurich

Eleos Arete CitriniJan 4, 2022, 12:49 PM
19 points
0 comments4 min readEA link

Will MacAskill: Why should effec­tive al­tru­ists em­brace un­cer­tainty?

EA GlobalDec 4, 2018, 4:23 PM
33 points
2 comments8 min readEA link

How to be a high im­pact philosopher

William_MacAskillMay 8, 2012, 4:00 AM
3 points
0 comments3 min readEA link

[Question] Are many EAs philo­soph­i­cal prag­ma­tists?

rortyAug 30, 2021, 3:51 PM
9 points
7 comments1 min readEA link

Against philan­thropic diversification

JackMDec 22, 2022, 1:28 PM
44 points
18 comments3 min readEA link
(ethicaleconomist.substack.com)

Be­ware sur­pris­ing and sus­pi­cious convergence

Gregory Lewis🔸Jan 24, 2016, 7:11 PM
219 points
21 comments15 min readEA link

The world is full of wasted motion

Neel NandaAug 5, 2020, 8:41 PM
21 points
2 comments11 min readEA link
(www.neelnanda.io)

[Question] What val­ues would EA want to pro­mote?

James_BanksJul 9, 2020, 6:35 AM
34 points
7 comments1 min readEA link

What is In­ter­sec­tion­al­ity The­ory? What does it mean for EA?

John Bridge 🔸Mar 27, 2022, 8:41 PM
28 points
42 comments5 min readEA link

Book launch: “Effec­tive Altru­ism: Philo­soph­i­cal Is­sues” (Oxford)

Aaron Gertler 🔸Sep 18, 2019, 12:23 AM
37 points
4 comments2 min readEA link

In defence of epistemic modesty

Gregory Lewis🔸Oct 29, 2017, 7:15 PM
140 points
51 comments37 min readEA link

Effec­tive­ness is a Con­junc­tion of Multipliers

Thomas KwaMar 25, 2022, 6:44 PM
259 points
34 comments4 min readEA link

Aid Scep­ti­cism and Effec­tive Altruism

William_MacAskillJul 3, 2019, 11:34 AM
71 points
13 comments2 min readEA link

Some Modes of Think­ing about EA

EdoAradNov 9, 2019, 5:54 PM
54 points
3 comments3 min readEA link

[Pod­cast] Tom Moynihan on why prior gen­er­a­tions missed some of the biggest pri­ori­ties of all

Eevee🔹Jun 25, 2021, 3:39 PM
12 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(80000hours.org)

How to be a high im­pact philoso­pher, part II

William_MacAskillSep 27, 2012, 4:00 AM
0 points
0 comments3 min readEA link

Hilary Greaves: Do­ing good to­gether — col­lec­tivism vs. coordination

EA GlobalNov 3, 2017, 7:43 AM
7 points
0 comments1 min readEA link
(www.youtube.com)

The Nar­row­ing Cir­cle (Gw­ern)

Aaron Gertler 🔸Feb 11, 2019, 11:50 PM
52 points
17 comments5 min readEA link

[Question] A Use­ful Distinc­tion: Card-Car­ry­ing Effec­tive Altru­ists Ver­sus Philo­soph­i­cal Effec­tive Altruists

OmnizoidJan 29, 2023, 8:11 PM
16 points
3 comments1 min readEA link

Maybe longter­mism isn’t for everyone

Eevee🔹Feb 10, 2023, 4:48 PM
39 points
17 comments1 min readEA link

Gra­di­ent Des­cent as an anal­ogy for Do­ing Good

JWS 🔸Oct 11, 2024, 11:12 AM
16 points
1 comment8 min readEA link

‘Why not effec­tive al­tru­ism?’ — Richard Y. Chappell

PabloNov 22, 2023, 3:04 PM
68 points
7 comments1 min readEA link
(philpapers.org)

Some im­pli­ca­tions of rad­i­cal empathy

MichaelStJulesJan 7, 2025, 4:10 PM
15 points
0 comments7 min readEA link

Prac­ti­cal ethics re­quires meta­phys­i­cal Free Will

Astra KamratowskiApr 7, 2022, 2:47 PM
2 points
1 comment13 min readEA link

Valu­ing lives in­stru­men­tally leads to un­com­fortable conclusions

Karthik TadepalliSep 4, 2022, 9:32 PM
17 points
16 comments1 min readEA link

Works in Progress: The Long Jour­ney to Do­ing Good Bet­ter by Dustin Moskovitz [Linkpost]

Nathan YoungFeb 14, 2024, 7:43 PM
119 points
3 comments1 min readEA link
(medium.com)

[Question] How can I ap­ply per­son-af­fect­ing views to Effec­tive Altru­ism?

The_Lord's_Servant_280Apr 29, 2020, 4:57 AM
19 points
21 comments1 min readEA link

How to Ad­dress EA Dilem­mas – What is Miss­ing from EA Values?

alexis schoenlaubOct 13, 2024, 9:33 AM
7 points
4 comments6 min readEA link

The role of effec­tive giv­ing in effec­tive al­tru­ism (MCF 2024 memo)

Sjir Hoeijmakers🔸Oct 2, 2024, 1:11 PM
20 points
0 comments4 min readEA link

Cain Killed Abel: A Heuris­tic Guide to the Three Ma­jor Schools of Ethics in the Western Tradition

Mahendra PrasadAug 20, 2021, 1:06 AM
15 points
0 comments3 min readEA link

Effec­tive Altru­ism FAQ

OmnizoidDec 16, 2024, 4:26 PM
18 points
1 comment12 min readEA link

The Case for Education

SamuelKnocheAug 14, 2020, 5:26 PM
24 points
10 comments10 min readEA link

EA over­looks the ‘Why’

Joseph SarvaryJan 3, 2025, 6:47 PM
0 points
2 comments7 min readEA link

Pos­si­ble im­por­tance of Effec­tive Altru­ism in the civ­i­liz­ing process

idea21Jan 8, 2025, 12:56 AM
1 point
0 comments1 min readEA link

Con­fi­dence in the premises of the Repug­nant Con­clu­sion—re­sults from a small survey

Vasco Grilo🔸Oct 8, 2022, 9:08 PM
19 points
2 comments1 min readEA link

What About Deon­tol­ogy? Ethics of So­cial Belong­ing and Con­for­mity in Effec­tive Altruism

Maksens DjabaliJan 8, 2025, 2:02 PM
7 points
1 comment4 min readEA link

Stu­art Rus­sell Hu­man Com­pat­i­ble AI Roundtable with Allan Dafoe, Rob Re­ich, & Ma­ri­etje Schaake

Mahendra PrasadFeb 11, 2021, 7:43 AM
16 points
0 comments1 min readEA link

Com­mon-sense cases where “hy­po­thet­i­cal fu­ture peo­ple” matter

tlevinAug 12, 2022, 2:05 PM
107 points
21 comments4 min readEA link

Whole­hearted choices and “moral­ity as taxes”

Joe_CarlsmithDec 21, 2020, 7:35 PM
85 points
9 comments4 min readEA link

[Question] Why “cause area” as the unit of anal­y­sis?

riceissaJan 25, 2021, 2:53 AM
85 points
21 comments4 min readEA link

The Epistemic Challenge to Longter­mism (Tarsney, 2020)

MichaelA🔸Apr 4, 2021, 3:09 AM
79 points
27 comments2 min readEA link
(globalprioritiesinstitute.org)

Toby Ord’s The Scourge, Reviewed

ColdButtonIssuesAug 30, 2022, 9:01 PM
59 points
25 comments4 min readEA link

Con­cerns/​Thoughts over in­ter­na­tional aid, longter­mism and philo­soph­i­cal notes on speak­ing with Larry Temkin.

Ben YeohJul 27, 2022, 7:51 PM
35 points
1 comment12 min readEA link

In­ves­ti­gat­ing Ide­ol­ogy: want to earn money, help EA and/​or me? Then check this out; it may be a mighty ne­glected cause

DovAug 12, 2022, 5:52 AM
3 points
6 comments22 min readEA link

Why effec­tive al­tru­ism used to be like ev­i­dence-based medicine. But isn’t anymore

James Snowden🔸Aug 12, 2015, 3:13 PM
29 points
16 comments1 min readEA link

Be­hav­ioral/​Cog­ni­tive Psy­chol­ogy and EA

Jung EnthusiastDec 13, 2020, 4:15 PM
−4 points
2 comments1 min readEA link

The Value of a Life

So8resFeb 17, 2015, 5:33 PM
38 points
11 comments10 min readEA link

Philo­soph­i­cal Cri­tiques of Effec­tive Altru­ism by Prof Jeff McMahan

Robert_WiblinMay 3, 2016, 9:05 PM
50 points
9 comments12 min readEA link

[Question] Is the EA com­mu­nity re­ally ad­vo­cat­ing prin­ci­ples over con­clu­sions ?

Solal 🔸Dec 11, 2024, 4:31 PM
73 points
8 comments2 min readEA link

Alice Crary’s philo­soph­i­cal-in­sti­tu­tional cri­tique of EA: “Why one should not be an effec­tive al­tru­ist”

ben.smithFeb 25, 2021, 8:06 PM
21 points
7 comments2 min readEA link

Open Wallets, Empty Hearts [linkpost]

Benjamin M.Nov 23, 2024, 11:49 PM
34 points
4 comments1 min readEA link
(www.thenewatlantis.com)

An­nounc­ing the Longter­mism Fel­low­ship of EA Mu­nich—Ap­ply!

JacobAug 21, 2022, 8:08 AM
20 points
10 comments2 min readEA link

New Publi­ca­tion: Effec­tive Altru­ism and Reli­gion

dominicroserJan 25, 2022, 9:22 AM
74 points
10 comments1 min readEA link

What is your con­fi­dence in the premises of the Repug­nant Con­clu­sion?

Vasco Grilo🔸Sep 20, 2022, 4:30 PM
16 points
11 comments3 min readEA link

Longter­mism VS Neart­er­mism: Are we be­ing long-winded or short-sighted?

Prof.WeirdFeb 4, 2022, 9:08 AM
−2 points
0 comments4 min readEA link

All moral de­ci­sions in life are on a heavy-tailed distribution

Max GörlitzJul 4, 2022, 5:09 PM
41 points
6 comments2 min readEA link

Effec­tive vs Altruism

Liat ZviSep 16, 2022, 9:37 AM
2 points
1 comment2 min readEA link

Over­think­ing “Only Be a Story”

Mica WhiteJul 17, 2022, 10:53 PM
6 points
0 comments4 min readEA link

A full syl­labus on longtermism

jtmMar 5, 2021, 10:57 PM
110 points
13 comments8 min readEA link

Altru­ism isn’t about sacrifice

Jeff Kaufman 🔸Sep 6, 2013, 4:00 AM
6 points
0 comments1 min readEA link

Why Should We Donate Money to Char­ity?

JulianHazellMar 20, 2021, 5:07 PM
9 points
0 comments8 min readEA link
(www.givingwhatwecan.org)

Effec­tive Altru­ism and Eastern Ethics

EA LifestylesJul 7, 2023, 3:27 PM
75 points
16 comments3 min readEA link
(ealifestyles.substack.com)

Le idee “es­treme”

EA ItalyDec 31, 2022, 4:15 AM
1 point
0 comments5 min readEA link

Will Maskill Gave Up on Utili­tar­i­anism (and the rest of us are soon to fol­low)

johnburidanJul 11, 2022, 2:10 AM
−1 points
7 comments3 min readEA link

May 5th Event: Democ­racy, Altru­ism, & the Ethics of Transna­tional Aid

Mahendra PrasadMay 5, 2021, 5:33 AM
2 points
0 comments1 min readEA link

Socrates Café: A Differ­ent Ap­proach to Dis­cus­sion

Ryan AdlerJun 4, 2022, 11:34 PM
27 points
6 comments3 min readEA link

Yascha Mounk has started a se­ries of es­says on effec­tive altruism

James HerbertNov 11, 2024, 4:16 PM
9 points
4 comments1 min readEA link
(yaschamounk.substack.com)

Get­ting on a differ­ent train: can Effec­tive Altru­ism avoid col­laps­ing into ab­sur­dity?

Peter McLaughlinOct 7, 2022, 10:52 AM
187 points
61 comments18 min readEA link

Cause Plu­ral­ity vs Cause Prioritization

Joey🔸Nov 11, 2024, 9:59 AM
83 points
14 comments10 min readEA link

Against Ad­dress­ing Root Causes

OmnizoidFeb 4, 2025, 4:45 PM
31 points
13 comments4 min readEA link

Cap­i­tal­ism and the Very Long Term

NikhilVenkateshJan 29, 2025, 4:12 PM
48 points
16 comments1 min readEA link
(www.degruyter.com)

What is effec­tive al­tru­ism?

William_MacAskillMay 13, 2013, 4:00 AM
15 points
23 comments2 min readEA link