Effective Altruism
Effective Altruism
Effective altruism is a philosophy and social movement which believes that people should become better-informed donors and “give with their heads as well as their hearts.” Proponents aim to “apply evidence and reason to working out the most effective ways to improve the world.”[1]
The movement is built upon the simple but profound idea that living a fully ethical life means using your spare resources for the “most good you can do” — basically, we can do much more to help others / save lives if we take a more objective and rational approach to what we do with our abilities, time and money. We should think less sentimentally about who and what we support, and not allow emotion, intuition or brand loyalty to dictate our giving behaviour.[2]
The idea behind effective altruism can be traced back to the 18th Century social reformer Jeremy Bentham,[3] but its modern revival is usually credited to philosophers Peter Singer [4] and Peter Unger.[5] In essence, people have a moral obligation to help those in need: as Singer puts it: “If it is in our power to prevent something bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, then we ought, morally, to do it.”
The idea behind effective altruism can be traced back to the 18th Century social reformer Jeremy Bentham,[3] but its modern revival is usually credited to philosophers Peter Singer [4] and Peter Unger.[5] In essence, people have a moral obligation to help those in need: as Singer puts it: “If it is in our power to prevent something bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, then we ought, morally, to do it.”
Effective altruists (EAs) argue that some charities are more cost-effective than others at achieving their goals and that it is they
that should have our support. EAs seem to like to support three causes in particular: the alleviation of poverty in the developing world, the alleviation of the suffering of animals in factory farms, and tackling existential risks to civilization and the planet, eg the dangers associated with biotechnology, advanced artificial intelligence, and catastrophic climate change. EAs argue that it is a moral duty to alleviate suffering through donations, with some pledging to donate a percentage of their income (10%+) for the remainder of their working lives through initiatives such as Giving What We Can. Some choose to work in higher-paying careers with the explicit goal of donating more money to charity than they could do otherwise, for example, by their working in the charity sector. And a few take the approach to extremes, pursuing a frugal lifestyle in order to increase their giving to a point that is way beyond the norm.
Examples of Ethical Dilemmas
Which is the better thing to do, to provide a guide dog to a blind person (in a rich country), or to cure dozens, possibly hundreds, of people of sight loss (in a developing country);[6] or, instead of buying a birthday present for a friend or relative (perhaps a present that they didn’t really want or need) should we not make a donation to a bona fide
charity that would endeavour to use the money to help someone (in a poor country) who is in much greater need? [7]Can one justify making a sick child’s wish come true when the money might be used to save the lives of many
children living in poor, malaria-prone regions of the world eg by providing bed nets or medicines? Here’s a real-life example: in 2013, 20,000 people gathered in San Francisco to watch a five-year-old boy, Miles Scott, dressed as ‘Batkid’ ride around the city in a Batmobile with an actor dressed as Batman. Miles had been through three years of chemotherapy for leukaemia, and when asked for his greatest wish, he replied, “To be Batkid.” The Make-A-Wish Foundation
made Miles’ wish come true
— and at an estimated cost of around $7,500...
The Benefits of Effective Altruism
There’s clearly real merit in the effective altruism approach: proponents argue that in addition to reducing suffering, extending lives, and improving the quality of living, effective altruism encourages greater charitable giving and inspires critical thinking (which can add meaning to our lives and help us to find fulfilment / make us ‘feel good’). It can encourage us to look beyond our own interests and value all forms of sentient life, regardless of species, and welcome and endorse differences in nationality, creed, ancestry and religion. Effective altruism can also incentivise organisations to be more transparent and demonstrate their effectiveness (in order to gain the support of the effective altruism community).
However, if taken to its extreme, effective altruism can lead to some uncomfortable conclusions. For example, in relation to poverty alleviation, EAs argue that all lives are of equal intrinsic value, and from this it follows that they should reject the idea that a person in one’s own community — perhaps even a family member — is of more interest/concern than a complete stranger living in a poor country who the donor cannot possibly empathise with as closely. Some EAs believe that the interests of animals should be accorded the same moral weight as the interests of human beings and work to prevent animal suffering, notably in factory farms;[8] whilst others focus on reducing existential risks to humanity, holding that future generations have equal moral value to people alive today. They argue that the total value of any meaningful indicator (wealth, potential for suffering, potential for happiness, etc.) summed up over future generations, far exceeds the value for people living today.
There’s clearly real merit in the effective altruism approach: proponents argue that in addition to reducing suffering, extending lives, and improving the quality of living, effective altruism encourages greater charitable giving and inspires critical thinking (which can add meaning to our lives and help us to find fulfilment / make us ‘feel good’). It can encourage us to look beyond our own interests and value all forms of sentient life, regardless of species, and welcome and endorse differences in nationality, creed, ancestry and religion. Effective altruism can also incentivise organisations to be more transparent and demonstrate their effectiveness (in order to gain the support of the effective altruism community).
However, if taken to its extreme, effective altruism can lead to some uncomfortable conclusions. For example, in relation to poverty alleviation, EAs argue that all lives are of equal intrinsic value, and from this it follows that they should reject the idea that a person in one’s own community — perhaps even a family member — is of more interest/concern than a complete stranger living in a poor country who the donor cannot possibly empathise with as closely. Some EAs believe that the interests of animals should be accorded the same moral weight as the interests of human beings and work to prevent animal suffering, notably in factory farms;[8] whilst others focus on reducing existential risks to humanity, holding that future generations have equal moral value to people alive today. They argue that the total value of any meaningful indicator (wealth, potential for suffering, potential for happiness, etc.) summed up over future generations, far exceeds the value for people living today.
Quality-Adjusted Life-Years
An AE may base their selection of charities involved in, say healthcare provision in Africa, or organising cash transfers to vulnerable and needy individuals. To do this it is important to have some idea about the lives intended to be saved or improved per dollar or pound spent — this is referred to as ‘Quality-Adjusted Life-Years’ saved (QALY), or ‘Disability-Adjusted Life-Years’ averted (DALY).One QALY equates to one year in perfect health. If an individual's health is impaired, the QALY is adjusted accordingly. Someone who is bed-bound (but alive) might rate 0.5 QALYs on this scale; whilst being dead is associated with 0 QALYs. (Some contend that there are health states worse
than being dead, and that therefore negative values should be possible on the health spectrum…) QALYs can, in principle, be used to inform personal decisions or evaluate programs, but this does raise the question of how claims are verified.
Indeed, weighting people’s health is tricky. It is usually determined by asking people to a) choose between remaining in a state of ill health for a period of time, or being restored to perfect health but with a shorter life expectancy (time-trade-off); or b) choose between remaining in a state of ill health for a period of time or choosing a medical intervention which has a chance of either restoring them to perfect health, or killing them (standard gamble); or c) rate a state of ill health on a scale from 0 to 100 (visual analogue scale). Some critics maintain that determining the level of health depends on measures that place disproportionate importance on physical pain or disability over mental health.
The Case Against Effective Altruism
Detractors assert that effective altruism paints decisions as black and white when in reality “the world is messy and complex;” and that the approach assumes that we can “give our way out of the problems that we have helped to create” (which isn’t sustainable). Moreover, effective altruism does not address “broken value systems, debt, imperialism, corruption, and power inequality,” and in the end “doesn’t change the status quo” but simply “make a broken system a little bit better.” It also requires a level of expertise that few individuals possess. Since most people are driven by emotion when giving, pushing them to be more judicious may result in their actually giving less. By claiming the moral high ground and weighing causes and beneficiaries against one another, critics argue, effective altruism is akin to "charitable imperialism," with ‘experts’ deciding where money goes rather than donors. Detractors also consider the idea of doing a highly paid but ‘unethical’ job in order to increase donor power is fundamentally immoral, no matter the reason.
Berger and Penna argue that effective altruism's “superficially enticing ‘logic’… ultimately leads to a moralistic, hyper-rationalistic, top-down approach to philanthropy that can kill the very altruistic spirit it claims to foster;” and that the advice given by EAs ranges from the insulting (“focus on how one’s actions are likely to affect the world, rather than on how they affect oneself and one’s feelings”), to the banal (“be open to unconventional approaches to doing good”). They contend that this is not informed, and advise donors to “choose what they’re passionate about.”[9]
They accuse GiveWell ("Don’t just give. Make your dollar go further"), one of the main organisations promoting effective altruism, of “doing more harm than good to both the donor community and those thousands upon thousands of organizations that are doing much-needed work in areas that the defective altruism fringe [their terminology] deems unworthy.” In GiveWell’s case, they say “this bizarre approach led to its recommendation to not assist the victims of the Japanese Tsunami.” [10] And they go further and argue that a major downside of this approach is what would happen to eg: domestic efforts to serve those in need?; advanced research funding for many diseases?; many local and smaller charitable endeavours?; funding for the arts, and important cultural endeavours such as the preservation of historically important structures and archives?; and volunteerism for the general public.
Detractors assert that effective altruism paints decisions as black and white when in reality “the world is messy and complex;” and that the approach assumes that we can “give our way out of the problems that we have helped to create” (which isn’t sustainable). Moreover, effective altruism does not address “broken value systems, debt, imperialism, corruption, and power inequality,” and in the end “doesn’t change the status quo” but simply “make a broken system a little bit better.” It also requires a level of expertise that few individuals possess. Since most people are driven by emotion when giving, pushing them to be more judicious may result in their actually giving less. By claiming the moral high ground and weighing causes and beneficiaries against one another, critics argue, effective altruism is akin to "charitable imperialism," with ‘experts’ deciding where money goes rather than donors. Detractors also consider the idea of doing a highly paid but ‘unethical’ job in order to increase donor power is fundamentally immoral, no matter the reason.
Berger and Penna argue that effective altruism's “superficially enticing ‘logic’… ultimately leads to a moralistic, hyper-rationalistic, top-down approach to philanthropy that can kill the very altruistic spirit it claims to foster;” and that the advice given by EAs ranges from the insulting (“focus on how one’s actions are likely to affect the world, rather than on how they affect oneself and one’s feelings”), to the banal (“be open to unconventional approaches to doing good”). They contend that this is not informed, and advise donors to “choose what they’re passionate about.”[9]
They accuse GiveWell ("Don’t just give. Make your dollar go further"), one of the main organisations promoting effective altruism, of “doing more harm than good to both the donor community and those thousands upon thousands of organizations that are doing much-needed work in areas that the defective altruism fringe [their terminology] deems unworthy.” In GiveWell’s case, they say “this bizarre approach led to its recommendation to not assist the victims of the Japanese Tsunami.” [10] And they go further and argue that a major downside of this approach is what would happen to eg: domestic efforts to serve those in need?; advanced research funding for many diseases?; many local and smaller charitable endeavours?; funding for the arts, and important cultural endeavours such as the preservation of historically important structures and archives?; and volunteerism for the general public.
In Conclusion
So, what should we conclude from this analysis? Well, there is clearly considerable value in the effective altruism approach if it encourages people to think more deeply about what they want to achieve when they donate to charity; however, there can be potentially serious disbenefits if donors are not careful, especially if they take the analysis to extremes.
So, what should we conclude from this analysis? Well, there is clearly considerable value in the effective altruism approach if it encourages people to think more deeply about what they want to achieve when they donate to charity; however, there can be potentially serious disbenefits if donors are not careful, especially if they take the analysis to extremes.
Caption
The graphic demonstrates quality-adjusted life years for two individuals. Individual A (who did not receive an intervention) has fewer QALYs than individual B (who received an intervention).
Footnotes
1 Much of the analysis on this page is a summary of material from Wikipedia (primarily here), also Singer and Berger & Penna.
2 For a detailed discussion of effective altruism and its underlying concepts see: https://concepts.effectivealtruism.org/
3 Bentham expounded the view that "It is the greatest good to the greatest number of people which is the measure of right and wrong."
4 In his 1972 paper ‘Famine, Affluence, and Morality’, Peter Singer argued that people have an obligation to help those in need. Then in his 2009 book ‘The Life You Can Save’, he claimed that people have a moral imperative to donate more because of the existence of extreme poverty. Singer himself gives a third of his income to charity.
5 Unger argues that “the citizens of first-world countries have a moral duty to make large donations to life-saving charities (such as Oxfam and UNICEF), and that once they have given all of their own money and possessions, beyond what is needed to survive, they should give what belongs to others, even if having to beg, borrow, or steal in the process.”
6 This is a Peter Singer example. (Some estimate the lifetime cost of a guide dog from birth to retirement could be as much as £50,000.)
7 This is an Eric Friedman example.
8 Proponents of animal rights believe that reducing animal suffering should be a major priority and that, at the current margin, there are cost-effective ways of accomplishing this. For example, Peter Singer argues that, if farm animals such as chickens are assigned even a modicum of consciousness, efforts to reduce factory farming (by reducing global meat consumption) could be an even more cost-effective way of reducing current global suffering than human poverty reduction. Some go further and include wild animal suffering.
9 The quotation is from the article by Berger & Penna (op cit, ref 1) who refer to effective altruism as ‘defective altruism’. They argue that defective altruism “not only unjustifiably claims the moral high ground in giving decisions, but also implements this bold claim by weighing causes and beneficiaries against one another. In this, it is not moral, but rather, moralistic in the worst sense of the word.”
10 Apparently, the charity discourages support for disaster relief in general, and Berger & Penna quote one long-time supporter as saying that “most of those killed by disasters could not have been saved with donations.”
The graphic demonstrates quality-adjusted life years for two individuals. Individual A (who did not receive an intervention) has fewer QALYs than individual B (who received an intervention).
Footnotes
1 Much of the analysis on this page is a summary of material from Wikipedia (primarily here), also Singer and Berger & Penna.
2 For a detailed discussion of effective altruism and its underlying concepts see: https://concepts.effectivealtruism.org/
3 Bentham expounded the view that "It is the greatest good to the greatest number of people which is the measure of right and wrong."
4 In his 1972 paper ‘Famine, Affluence, and Morality’, Peter Singer argued that people have an obligation to help those in need. Then in his 2009 book ‘The Life You Can Save’, he claimed that people have a moral imperative to donate more because of the existence of extreme poverty. Singer himself gives a third of his income to charity.
5 Unger argues that “the citizens of first-world countries have a moral duty to make large donations to life-saving charities (such as Oxfam and UNICEF), and that once they have given all of their own money and possessions, beyond what is needed to survive, they should give what belongs to others, even if having to beg, borrow, or steal in the process.”
6 This is a Peter Singer example. (Some estimate the lifetime cost of a guide dog from birth to retirement could be as much as £50,000.)
7 This is an Eric Friedman example.
8 Proponents of animal rights believe that reducing animal suffering should be a major priority and that, at the current margin, there are cost-effective ways of accomplishing this. For example, Peter Singer argues that, if farm animals such as chickens are assigned even a modicum of consciousness, efforts to reduce factory farming (by reducing global meat consumption) could be an even more cost-effective way of reducing current global suffering than human poverty reduction. Some go further and include wild animal suffering.
9 The quotation is from the article by Berger & Penna (op cit, ref 1) who refer to effective altruism as ‘defective altruism’. They argue that defective altruism “not only unjustifiably claims the moral high ground in giving decisions, but also implements this bold claim by weighing causes and beneficiaries against one another. In this, it is not moral, but rather, moralistic in the worst sense of the word.”
10 Apparently, the charity discourages support for disaster relief in general, and Berger & Penna quote one long-time supporter as saying that “most of those killed by disasters could not have been saved with donations.”
