Reflective altruism
I’m a philosopher at Vanderbilt University (views my own). The purpose of this blog is to use academic research to drive positive change within and around the effective altruism movement. Discussions are long-form and structured around thematic series. Subscribe below for weekly posts.
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Mistakes in the moral mathematics of existential risk (Part 4: Optimistic population dynamics)
I expand on the moral importance of modeling population dynamics by studying an optimistic growth model due to Christian Tarsney. I show that even in optimistic models, incorporating population dynamics tends to substantially decrease the expected value of existential risk mitigation.
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The good it promises (Part 7: Crary continued)
This post continues my discussion of Alice Crary’s essay, “Against `effective altruism’,” focusing on Crary’s composite critique of effective altruism.
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The good it promises (Part 6: Alice Crary)
Alice Crary’s essay “Against `effective altruism'” argues that effective altruism inherits a number of assumptions from consequentialism, including a focus on moral questions about particular actions and a framing of those questions in terms of the point of view of the universe.
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Meta: Posting less frequently
I’ll be reducing my posting frequency to biweekly rather than weekly, at least for the time being. Sorry.
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Exaggerating the risks (Part 10: Biorisk: More grounds for doubt)
Continuing my treatment of existential biorisk, I give four further reasons to suspect that existential biorisk may be lower than many claim it to be.
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Mistakes in the moral mathematics of existential risk (Part 3: Population dynamics)
I discuss a third mistake in the moral mathematics of existential risk: neglecting population dynamics. I show that the value of existential risk mitigation is sharply reduced in standard population models.
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Epistemics: (Part 5: The value of cost-effectiveness analysis)
The declining role of cost-effectiveness analysis comes with significant practical, symbolic, philosophical, and leadership-based costs. Spelling out these costs in detail will allow us to assess whether they are worth paying.
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Epistemics: (Part 4: The fall of cost-effectiveness analysis)
This post chronicles the declining role of cost-effectiveness analysis within the effective altruism movement. While early effective altruists championed the use of rigorous cost-effectiveness analyses, in many circles those methods have fallen decidedly out of favor.
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The good it promises (Part 5: de Coriolis et al.)
Andrew deCoriolis and colleagues urge effective altruists to dream big, keeping their eye on the prize: an end to factory farming. In this post, I discuss what deCoriolis and colleagues like about effective altruists’ animal advocacy work, and what changes they’d like to see.