tl;dr: It actually seems pretty rare for people to care about the general good as such (i.e., optimizing cause-agnostic impartial... more

In Continued Defense Of Effective Altruism — Scott Alexander

I took the GWWC Pledge in 2018, while I was an undergraduate student. I only have a hazy recollection of... more

The last year has been toughThe last year has been tough for EA. FTX blew up in the most spectacular... more

Rob Mather, CEO, AMF, 25 November 20232023 has been a very busy year for AMF, more on 2024 later.ImpactAMF's team... more

With immense sadness, we want to let the community know about the passing of Sebastian Lodemann, who lost his life... more

Despite the complicated and imperfect origins of American Thanksgiving, what's worth preserving is the moment it offers for society to... more

The Giving What We Can research team is excited to share the results of our first round of evaluations of... more

In honor of “Marginal Funding Week” for 2023 Giving Season on the EA Forum, I’d like to tell you what... more

Just as~2 years ago, the EA Animal Welfare Fund has significant room for more funding. This could be a pretty... more

Thanks to Michael St. Jules for his comments.Key TakeawaysThe evidence that animal welfare dominates in neartermism is strong.Open Philanthropy (OP)... more

The board of directors of OpenAI, Inc, the 501(c)(3) that acts as the overall governing body for all OpenAI activities,... more

Summary We (Habiba Banu and Roxanne Heston) have launched Spiro, a new TB screening and prevention charity focused on children. Our... more

(Cross-posted from my website) I’ve written a report about whether advanced AIs will fake alignment during training in order to get... more

This post summarizes how my partner and I decided whether to have children or not. We spent hundreds of hours... more

(Written in a personal capacity, and not representing either my current employer or former one)In 2016, I founded Utility Farm,... more

I spoke with some people who worked or served on the board at organizations that had a leadership transition after... more

Athena is a new research mentorship program fostering diversity of ideas in AI safety research. We aim to get more... more

General note: The bulk of this post was written a couple of months ago, but I am releasing it now... more

This write-up is a compilation of organisations and projects aligned / adjacent to the effective altruism movement in East Asia... more

TLDR: The best research we have shows that clean water may provide a 30% mortality reduction to children under 5.... more

This post is a part of Rethink Priorities’ Worldview Investigations Team's CURVE Sequence: “Causes and Uncertainty: Rethinking Value in Expectation.”... more

A key question for many interventions' impact is how long the intervention changes some output counterfactually, or how long the... more

YouGov recently reported the results of a survey (n=1000) suggesting that about “one in five (22%) Americans are familiar with... more

IntroA few months ago, the other (former) Alvea executives and I made the difficult decision to wind Alvea down and... more

After careful consideration, we made the difficult decision to wind Alvea down and return our remaining funds to investors. This... more

Released today (10/30/23) this is crazy, perhaps the most sweeping action taken by government on AI yet. Below, I've segmented... more

Views are my own, not Open Philanthropy's. I am married to the President of Anthropic and have a financial interest... more

SummaryGiven EA's history and values, I’d have expected for impact evaluation to be a distinguishing feature of the movement. In... more

Figure 1  (see full caption below)This post is a part of Rethink Priorities' Worldview Investigations Team's CURVE Sequence: "Causes and... more

I am excited about AI developers implementing responsible scaling policies; I’ve recently been spending time refining this idea and advocating... more

NIMBYs don’t call themselves NIMBYs. They call themselves affordable housing advocates or community representatives or environmental campaigners. They’re usually not... more

After launching our first batch of 2023 charities in April, we are now thrilled to announce the launch of four... more

Summary of Findings It has been almost a year since FTX went bankrupt on November 11, 2022. Some of the ways... more

This post is a part of Rethink Priorities’ Worldview Investigations Team's CURVE Sequence: “Causes and Uncertainty: Rethinking Value in Expectation.”... more

I’m a grantmaker who previously spent a decade as a professional investor. I’ve recently helped some Open Phil, GiveWell, and... more

Philanthropist Chuck Feeney died on October 9, at 92. He founded one of the largest private charitable foundations in history,... more

Crosspost from Astral Codex Ten. I.Last month, Ben West of the Center for Effective Altruism hosted a debate among long-termists,... more

Last year, we committed $350 million to GiveWell's evidence-backed, cost-effective recommendations in global health and development.This year, we’re committing $300M... more

In the latest episode of the 80,000 Hours podcast, Kevin Esvelt talks about the New World screwworm. He claims that... more

Key PointsAnimal parties are minor (niche) political parties with a single-issue focus on animals.Animal parties can win seats in elections... more

Epistemic status: Hot takes for discussion. These observations are a side product of another strategy project, rather than a systematic... more

This is a summary of a report on trends in violence since the dawn of humanity: from the hunter-gatherer period... more

From the looks of it, next week might be rough for people who care about Effective Altruism. As CEA acting... more

It's been another busy year at Open Philanthropy; after nearly doubling the size of our team in 2022, we’ve added... more

As some of you know, I’m working on growing the US market for Chinese tofus. I believe it could be... more

I’m extremely excited to announce the launch of our new community strategy that aims to connect our existing community better,... more

OverviewThe total moral value of the world includes humans as well as all other beings of moral significance. As such,... more

Andy Weber was the U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Nuclear, Chemical & Biological Defense Programs from 2009 to 2014.... more

Our team at Our World in Data just launched a new page on animal welfare! There you can find a... more

SummaryShrimp Welfare Project launched in Sep 2021, via the Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program. We aim to reduce the suffering of... more

In this post I talk about several strong non-epistemic incentives and issues that can influence people to pursue longtermist[1]career paths... more

In March of this year, 30,000 people, including leading AI figures like Yoshua Bengio and Stuart Russell, signed a letter... more

Earlier today, Will MacAskill stepped down from the board of Effective Ventures UK[1], having served as a trustee since its... more

tl;dr: Advocacy to the public is a large and neglected opportunity to advance AI Safety. AI Safety as a field... more

I don't have much time to get into this, but I heard rumblings, saw a post, and wrote a comment,... more

Personal opinion only. Inspired by filling out the Meta coordination forum survey. Epistemic status: Very uncertain, rough speculation. I’d be... more

When talking to newcomers to the field of biosecurity, I often felt annoyed that there wasn't a single introductory resource... more

Should we lobby governments to impose a moratorium on AI research? Since we don’t enforce pauses on most new technologies,... more

I’m Catherine, and I'm one of the Community Liaisons working in CEA's Community Health and Special Projects Team. This is... more

Citation: Romero Waldhorn, D., & Autric, E. (2022, December 21). Shrimp: The animals most commonly used and killed for food... more

There has already been ample discussion of what norms and taboos should exist in the EA community, especially over the... more

Epistemic status: Once I started actively looking into things, much of my information in the post below came about by... more

On 23rd August, Nick Beckstead stepped down from the boards of Effective Ventures UK and Effective Ventures US.For context, EV... more

In which: I list 9 projects that I would work on if I wasn’t busy working on safety standards at... more

I sometimes get a vibe that many people trying to ambitiously do good in the world (including EAs) are misguided... more

TLDR: This post is part of a sequence we’ve prepared for the Career Conversations Week on the EA Forum. This... more

I work as a Resident Assistant at my college. Last year, only a few weeks into me starting, I was... more

Congrats on having invented something exciting! Usually, the best way to get innovative new technology into the hands of beneficiaries quickly... more

Hi folks, in this post we’d like to describe our views as the Chair (Peter) and Director (Michael) of HLI... more

This piece defends a strong form of epistemic modesty: that, in most cases, one should pay scarcely any attention to... more

Progress report on CEA’s search for a new CEOI[1] wanted to give an update on the Centre for Effective Altruism... more

Pure Earth is a GiveWell Grantee dedicated to reducing lead exposure in low- and middle-income countries. In collaboration with Stanford... more

For most people I don't think it's important to have a really precise definition of integrity. But if you really want to... more

TL;DR: EAGs from 2022–2023 each cost around $2M–$3.6M USD at around $1.5k–2.5k per person per event.These events typically cost a... more

Nuclear winter is a topic that many have heard about, but where significant confusion can occur. I certainly knew little... more

∼250,000 new contraceptive users, ∼20 million new listeners and up to ∼60x cost effectivenessTL;DR: In 2021, FEM launched our pilot: a... more

SummaryImpact obsession is a potentially unhelpful way of relating to doing good which we’ve observed among effective altruists, including ourselves. (More)What do... more

Sometimes, there is a reason other grantmakers aren't funding a fairly well-known EA (-adjacent) project. This post is written in... more

These are my own views, and not those of my employer, EVOps, or of CEA who I have contracted for... more

Imagine this: • > Oliver: … Thus we see that donating to the opera is the best way of promoting... more

Plant-based meats, like the Beyond Sausage or Impossible Burger, and cultivated meats have become a source of optimism for reducing... more

What is the definition of Effective Altruism? What claims does it make? What do you have to believe or do,... more

This is a blog post, not a research report, meaning it was produced quickly and is not to Rethink Priorities’... more

SummaryPrevious research from Rethink Priorities found that a majority of the population (59%) agreed with a statement from the Center... more

Today is my two-year anniversary with EA NYC, where I serve as director. To say I've learned a lot would... more

Prompted by the FTX collapse, the rapid progress in AI, and increased mainstream acceptance of AI risk concerns, there has... more

Actions that have a large impact sometimes don't feel like much. To counteract that bias, I'm sharing arguably the best... more

I'm working writing more, quicker, and not directly for an EA Forum audience. This is a post copied over from... more

TLDR: On early-stage analysis, persuading people to soak their beans before cooking could  cost-effectively save Sub-saharan Africans a significant amount... more

Or: “Why EA biosecurity epistemics are whack”The effective altruism (EA) biosecurity community focuses on reducing the risks associated with global... more

I collected my favorite public pieces of research on AI strategy, governance, and forecasting from 2023 so far.If you're a... more

I recently resigned as Columbia EA President and have stepped away from the EA community. This post aims to explain... more

EA-motivated specialists sometimes offer free or subsidized versions of normally expensive services to EA projects. I think this is often... more

I'm stepping down as chair of the Long-Term Future Fund. I'm writing this post partially as a loose set of... more

Views expressed in this article are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer SecureBio.SummaryFar-UVC has great promise,... more

On Tuesday, the US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law held a hearing on AI. The hearing... more

TL;DR: When I say “General EA” I am referring to the cluster including the term “effective altruism,” the idea of... more

SummaryWe are launching the Meta Charity Funders, a growing network of donors sharing knowledge and discussing funding opportunities in the EA... more

SummaryQuadratic funding (QF) is a mechanism that has gained attention as a potential way to improve resource allocation in a... more

Crossposted from my blog.  The horror of fish farmingOne of my professors in college taught a class about effective altruism—a... more

Since writing The Precipice, one of my aims has been to better understand how reducing existential risk compares with other... more

Formerly known as "Aaron's Epistemic Stories", which stops working as a title when it's on the Forum and people aren't... more

WHY WRITE A POST ABOUT THEORIES OF CHANGE?As participants in a movement with ‘effective’ in its name, it’s easy to... more

On May 11, 2023, the Supreme Court of the United States upheld a 2018 California law, Proposition 12, which banned... more

Announcing Fatebook: a website that makes it extremely low friction to make and track predictions. … --- ... more

Update: Andrés Jiménez Zorrilla (CEO of SWP)  has provided some additional information in the comments. In particular: … The original... more

Manifund is launching a new regranting program! We will allocate ~$2 million over the next six months based on the... more

I would like to thank Lant Pritchett, David Roodman and Matt Lerner for their invaluable comments.You can follow these links to... more

This is a linkpost for "Forecasting Existential Risks: Evidence from a Long-Run Forecasting Tournament," accessible here: https://forecastingresearch.org/s/XPT.pdfToday, the Forecasting Research Institute (FRI)... more

IntroductionLast year, one conversation left a lasting impression on me. A friend remarked on the challenges of navigating "corrupting forces"... more

This is a tough one to post, it’s also a little off topic for the forum. I went back and... more

Lead Exposure Elimination Project (LEEP) is an outstanding Charity Entrepreneurship-incubated charity recognized externally for its impactful work by RP, Founders... more

TL;DR: We are excited to announce our Research Training Program. This online program is designed to equip participants with the... more

There was a debate on the statement “AI research and development poses an existential threat” (“x-risk” for short), with Max... more

This post is a slightly belated contribution to the Strategy Fortnight. It represents my personal takes only; I’m not speaking on... more

Epistemic Status: This is a subject I've been casually thinking about for a while, but I wrote this document fairly... more

StatusWhile this is part of EA Strategy Fortnight, my intention is to focus more on what effective altruism did well,... more

Epistemic status: This post is an edited version of an informal memo I wrote several months ago. I adapted it... more

I’m sharing the below as part of the EA Strategy Fortnight.  I think there’s value in discussing what the role of... more

This post is part of EA Strategy Fortnight. You can see other Strategy Fortnight posts here.I’ve been reflecting on the role of... more

Upside Foods and Good Meat, two companies that make what they call “cultivated chicken,” said Wednesday that they have gotten... more

The post contains a reflection on our journey as co-founders of Rethink Priorities. We are Peter Wildeford and Marcus A.... more

Some months ago, Rethink Priorities announced its interdisciplinary Worldview Investigation Team (WIT). Now, we’re pleased to introduce the team’s members:Bob Fischer... more

Epistemic status: This is a pretty detailed hypothesis that I think overall doesn’t add up to more than 50% of... more

Gesturing at a thing to mostly avoid. My personal opinion. This topic has been discussed on the EA Forum before, e.g.... more

A short and arguably unfinished blog post that I'm sharing as part of EA strategy fortnight. There's probably a lot... more

Tl;dr: This post, which is part of the EA Strategy Fortnight series, summarizes some of my current views about the... more

This post is a personal reflection that follows my journey to effective altruism, my experiences within it, the concerns I've... more

This is a frame that I have found useful and I'm sharing in case others find it useful. EA has arguably... more

Executive summaryOne of the biggest challenges of being in a community that really cares about counterfactuals is knowing where the... more

I carried out a short project to better understand talent needs in AI governance. This post reports on my findings.How... more

Epistemic Status: Low-to-medium confidence, informed by my experience with having a disability as an EA. I think the included recommendations... more

Crossposted on Medium here.Twitter: @lucreti_aFrom Lore Olympus.Thank you to the supportive EA members who encouraged me to publicly share this... more

In the 2000s, cost-effectiveness analysis said it was a bad use of money to send antiretroviral drugs to low-income countries—drugs... more

This post is a summary of some of my work as a field strategy consultant at Schmidt Futures' Act 2... more

Tl;dr: I’m kicking off a push for public discussions about EA strategy that will be happening June 12-24. You’ll see... more

Introduction“News through prediction markets”The Base Rate Times is a nascent news site that incorporates prediction markets prominently into its coverage.Please... more

This post is a summary of some of my work as a field strategy consultant at Schmidt Futures' Act 2... more

Epistemic status: some thoughts I wanted to get out quicklyA lot of fantastic work has been done by people in... more

This is partly based on my experiences working as a Program Officer leading Open Phil’s Longtermist EA Community Growth team,... more

From late 2020 to last month, I worked at grassroots-level non-profits in operational roles. Over that time, I’ve seen surprisingly... more

1. Tl;drMany reports indicate that indoor air quality (IAQ) interventions are likely to be effective at reducing respiratory disease transmission. However, to date... more

TL;DRWe are a new AI evals research organization called Apollo Research based in London. We think that strategic AI deception – where... more

Today, the AI Extinction Statement was released by the Center for AI Safety, a one-sentence statement jointly signed by a historic coalition... more

Dear EA Forum readers, The EA charity, Legal Impact for Chickens (LIC), just filed our second lawsuit! As many of you know,... more

Charity Entrepreneurship is frequently contacted by individuals and donors who like our model. Several have expressed interest in seeing the... more

Underrated is relative.[1] My position is something like "most people should consider going to >1 EAG talk" and not "most... more

I went to EAG London this weekend. I had some interesting chats, wrote some cryptic squiggles in my notebook (“Clockify”... more

We've just passed the half-year mark for this project! If you're reading this, please consider taking this 5 minute survey... more

How worried about AI risk will we feel in the future, when we can see advanced machine intelligence up close?... more

We've just passed the half-year mark for this project! If you're reading this, please consider taking this 5 minute survey... more

People often ask me for career advice related to AGI safety. This post summarizes the advice I most commonly give.... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/m2Y6HheC2Q2GLQ3oS/summaries-of-top-forum-posts-17th-23rd-april-2023This podcast has just passed the 6-month mark! Please give us your feedback and suggestions so we can continue... more

The excellent report from Rethink Priorities was my main source for this. Many of the substantial points I make are... more

This is a linkpost for a new 80,000 hours episode focused on how to engage in climate from an effective... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/o3Gaoizs2So6SpgLH/summaries-of-top-forum-posts-27th-march-to-16th-aprilThis podcast has just passed the 6-month mark! Please give us your feedback and suggestions so we can continue... more

I recently spent some time reflecting on my career and my life, for a few reasons:It was my 29th birthday,... more

This is a linkpost for https://www.forourposterity.com/want-to-win-the-agi-race-solve-alignment/Society really cares about safety. Practically speaking, the binding constraint on deploying your AGI could... more

Far fewer people are working on it than you might think, and even the alignment research that is happening is... more

In my last essay, I looked at two stories (brute preference for systematic-ness, and money-pumps) about why ethical anti-realists should... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/idpbfmPjHFCvzj46L/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-13th-19th-march-2023This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

Longtermists have argued that humanity should significantly increase its efforts to prevent catastrophes like nuclear wars, pandemics, and AI disasters.... more

Oral rehydration therapy is now the standard treatment for dehydration. It’s saved millions of lives, and can be prepared at... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/fWGdsWbS6vtC9E7ii/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-6th-12th-march-2023This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/yCxsz9jk5iau2uvYH/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-27th-feb-5th-mar-2023This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

This document looks at the predictions made by AI experts in The 2016 Expert Survey on Progress in AI, analyses... more

I don’t think the existing evidence justifies HLI's estimate of 50% household spillovers. My main disagreements are:Two of the three RCTs... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/bEJ6SyrkSF45B2LWZ/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-20th-26th-feb-2023This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

Ethical philosophy often tries to systematize. That is, it seeks general principles that will explain, unify, and revise our more... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/fAWotZTEnyycJnuxz/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-6th-19th-feb-2023This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

This is the story of how I came to see Wild Animal Welfare (WAW) as a less promising cause than... more

Apply now to start a nonprofit in Biosecurity or Large-Scale Global HealthIn this post we introduce our top five charity... more

Hi everyone,I've been reading up on H5N1 this weekend, and I'm pretty concerned. Right now my hunch is that there... more

This is a linkpost for https://epochai.org/blog/literature-review-of-transformative-artificial-intelligence-timelinesWe summarize and compare several models and forecasts predicting when transformative AI will be developed.HighlightsThe... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/Qzfew7EBPgdCzsxED/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-30th-jan-5th-feb-2023This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

This post outlines the capability approach to thinking about human welfare. I think that this approach, while very popular in... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/hzc26vGa4RLns7TvK/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-23rd-29th-jan-23This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/6Ezg8HgHib9bpWCFr/ea-and-lw-forum-weekly-summary-16th-22nd-jan-23This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

We offer welfare range estimates for 11 farmed species: pigs, chickens, carp, salmon, octopuses, shrimp, crayfish, crabs, bees, black soldier... more

For many years, I've actively lived in avoidance of idolizing behavior and in pursuit of a nuanced view of even... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/DNWpFLrtrJXe4mted/ea-and-lw-forum-summaries-9th-jan-to-15th-jan-23This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

I previously wrote an entry for the Open Philanthropy Cause Exploration Prize on why preventing violence against women and girls... more

In this post, we point out that short AI timelines would cause real interest rates to be high, and would... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/JZuCg7TtfzzaX9bBY/ea-and-lw-forum-summaries-holiday-edition-19th-dec-8th-janThis is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

At Anima International, we recently decided to suspend our campaign against live fish sales in Poland indefinitely. After a few... more

This is a linkpost for https://simonm.substack.com/p/strongminds-should-not-be-a-top-ratedGWWC lists StrongMinds as a “top-rated” charity. Their reason for doing so is because Founders... more

If you fear that someone will build a machine that will seize control of the world and annihilate humanity, then... more

In previous pieces, I argued that there's a real and large risk of AI systems' aiming to defeat all of... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/8bcPkqdLYG78YbnTh/ea-and-lw-forums-weekly-summary-5th-dec-11th-dec-22This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

Key TakeawaysOur objective: estimate the welfare ranges of 11 farmed species.Given hedonism, an individual’s welfare range is the difference between... more

Hiya folks! I'm Patrick McKenzie, better known on the Internets as patio11. (Proof.) Long-time-listener, first-time-caller; I don't think I would... more

Original article:https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/LdEPDqyZvucQkxhWH/ea-and-lw-forums-weekly-summary-28th-nov-4th-dec-22This is part of a weekly series summarizing the top posts on the EA Forum — you can see... more

Key Takeaways:Several influential EAs have suggested using neuron counts as rough proxies for animals’ relative moral weights. We challenge this... more

Long and rough notes on Effective Altruism (EA). Written to help me get to the bottom of several questions: what... more

This post introduces a framework for thinking about population ethics: “population ethics without axiology.” In its last section, I sketch... more

In “How Likely is World War III?”, Stephen suggested the chance of an extinction-level war occurring sometime this century is... more

In both the 1940s and 1950s, well-meaning and good people – the brightest of their generation – were convinced they... more

What We Owe The Future (WWOTF) by Will MacAskill has recently been released with much fanfare. While I strongly agree... more

This essay is a reconciliation of moral commitment and the good life. Here is its essence in two paragraphs:Totalized by... more