It's mentioned in the article several times, but if you're interested in making some analytically driven donations, quickly, https://www.givewell.org/ is the place to start.
Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
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Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#22> Not all of this money was given with the intention of maximising human welfare. Take, for instance, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which helps children stricken with life-threatening illnesses, by granting “wishes”, such as meeting celebrities or visiting theme parks. The typical wish costs the foundation around $10,000 to fulfil—heartwarming for the recipient but of little help in improving health generally. This pre…
> who value things differently Can you try to formulate those values? > I would add that the Make-A-Wish foundation has a very significant quality of life impact on the kids AND their support network But given the costs per instance that impact is only on a small fraction of all cases. A smaller impact for everyone or one that only materializes in the future would likely generate more utility if you add them up.
Here is a value that I have which is counter to ethical altruism:
I have a small amount of cash in my pocket, which will (given enough time) purchase junk food with. However, I see a random charity donation box so I put my money in that and feel happy that I've done two good things.
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#23> Not all of this money was given with the intention of maximising human welfare. Take, for instance, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which helps children stricken with life-threatening illnesses, by granting “wishes”, such as meeting celebrities or visiting theme parks. The typical wish costs the foundation around $10,000 to fulfil—heartwarming for the recipient but of little help in improving health generally. This pre…
EA? EDIT: Make-a-Wish seems more like a giant pr-machine. Granted it's helping some, but wasting a lot of resources that could be better allocated. I guess I am part of the movement, without ever thinking about it
There is a motivational value in Make-a-Wish. I'm not saying that extensive resources should be committed to it, but if emotional impact of a Make-a-Wish story spurs people to be more altruistic or become childhood leukemia researchers, then it's not wasted money.
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#24I would recommend checking out the podcast ‘The 80,000 hours’ if you are interested in this kind of stuff. It’s hosted by Rob Wiblin who is the executive director at Effective Altruism. He talks to very interesting people (mostly academics) about “the world's most pressing problems and how you can use your career to solve them” (taken from his website).
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#25> Not all of this money was given with the intention of maximising human welfare. Take, for instance, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which helps children stricken with life-threatening illnesses, by granting “wishes”, such as meeting celebrities or visiting theme parks. The typical wish costs the foundation around $10,000 to fulfil—heartwarming for the recipient but of little help in improving health generally. This pre…
"...seems to turn into shaming people who value things differently."
Freedom of association.
Why would I (willingly) do business with people working against me?
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#26> Not all of this money was given with the intention of maximising human welfare. Take, for instance, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which helps children stricken with life-threatening illnesses, by granting “wishes”, such as meeting celebrities or visiting theme parks. The typical wish costs the foundation around $10,000 to fulfil—heartwarming for the recipient but of little help in improving health generally. This pre…
EA? EDIT: Make-a-Wish seems more like a giant pr-machine. Granted it's helping some, but wasting a lot of resources that could be better allocated. I guess I am part of the movement, without ever thinking about it
It may be useful to consider the Make-a-Wish foundation as a performing arts organization that focuses on a large number of intimate performances.
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#27> Not all of this money was given with the intention of maximising human welfare. Take, for instance, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which helps children stricken with life-threatening illnesses, by granting “wishes”, such as meeting celebrities or visiting theme parks. The typical wish costs the foundation around $10,000 to fulfil—heartwarming for the recipient but of little help in improving health generally. This pre…
> who value things differently Can you try to formulate those values? > I would add that the Make-A-Wish foundation has a very significant quality of life impact on the kids AND their support network But given the costs per instance that impact is only on a small fraction of all cases. A smaller impact for everyone or one that only materializes in the future would likely generate more utility if you add them up.
Can you try to formulate those values?
But I might also donate to the charity that supports my cousin who has cerebral palsy, because I can see with my own eyes that they're doing good work; and because it's work I'd like to see continue.
Or I might donate to the charity that gave me a scholarship when I was younger, to repay them and so other people can benefit like I did.
Or I might donate to Wikipedia, because although it's hard to value wikipedia page views in terms of quality-adjusted life years saved, you can surely get a great many page views for your dollar.
Or maybe my colleague in work is running a marathon for charity, and although our professional relationship wouldn't be damaged at all if I didn't donate, our professional relationship would be improved if I did; perhaps I see a possibility to leverage better relationships into success at work.
Or I might consider that I have fully discharged my moral duty for this financial year by donations I've already made; and hence I can spend money on things that are utterly uncharitable if I feel like it, and spending money on things that are inefficiently charitable is relatively better than that.
Or I might donate to a political organisation, because I think I directly benefit from their activism....
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#28> Not all of this money was given with the intention of maximising human welfare. Take, for instance, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which helps children stricken with life-threatening illnesses, by granting “wishes”, such as meeting celebrities or visiting theme parks. The typical wish costs the foundation around $10,000 to fulfil—heartwarming for the recipient but of little help in improving health generally. This pre…
There's nothing shameful about donating to the Make-A-Wish foundation. It's certianly better to donate there than to spend the money on booze, video games, fancy clothes, etc or the vast majority of things competing for your money. But you still get far less moral credit for donating there than donating somewhere more effective. And yes, you can count the effects of the Foundation on the kids support network but remember that a kid who dies of malaria also has friends and family who will be affected by their death.
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
They probably do value spending $10,000 on making one dying kid happy higher than $10,000 worth of medical research. If you claim $10,000 worth of medical research will save the lives of several people then clearly we're doing something wrong with the other billions we spend on medical research.
Medical Research saves a lot of lives over time. A drug that saves 1,000 lives per year worldwide at the cost of 1 billion dollars seems expensive. But that's 1 million lives over the next 100 years for 10,000$ each and we would still know how to make that drug in 100 years. Dropping that to 1,000$ per life over ~1000 years. And if you consider 1 billion per 1 thousand lives/year then cancers's 8.2 million deaths/yea…
While that's true something like $10,000 would at best accelerate medical research a bit, ultimately it will only save those people for whom medical research would have otherwise been too late. It's not entirely clear what this figure would be, but with billions spend each year it's probably not several per $10,000.
Re: Can “effective altruism” maximise the bang for each charitable buck?
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
They probably do value spending $10,000 on making one dying kid happy higher than $10,000 worth of medical research. If you claim $10,000 worth of medical research will save the lives of several people then clearly we're doing something wrong with the other billions we spend on medical research.
$10k worth of malaria nets will save a couple of lives.
That's a fair point, but ultimately people are going to care more about children that are 'closer' to them. You're free to criticize people for this, but it probably won't do you any favours.