EA Forum Podcast (Curated & popular)

or Maximizing Good Within Your Personal Constraints Note: The specific numbers and examples below are approximations meant to illustrate the framework. Your actual calculations will vary based on your situation, values, and cause area. The goal isn't precision—it's to start thinking explicitly about impact per unit of sacrifice rather than assuming certain actions are inherently virtuous. You're at an EA meetup. Two people are discussing their impact: Alice: "I went vegan, buy only secondhand, bike everywhere, and donate 5% of my nonprofit salary to animal charities." Bob: "I work in finance, eat whatever, and donate 40% of my income to animal charities." Who gets more social approval? Alice. Who prevents more animal suffering? Bob—by orders of magnitude. Alice's choices improve welfare for hundreds of animal-years annually through diet change and her $2,500 donation. Bob's $80,000 donation improves tens of thousands of animal-years through corporate campaigns. Yet Alice is [...] ---Outline:(00:11) or Maximizing Good Within Your Personal Constraints(01:31) The Personal Constraint Framework(02:26) Return on Sacrifice (RoS): The Core Metric(03:05) Case Studies: Where Good Intentions Go Wrong(03:10) Career: The Counterfactual Question(04:32) Environmental Action: Personal vs. Systemic(05:13) Information and Influence(05:45) Truth vs. Reach(06:17) The Uncomfortable Truth About Offsets(07:43) When Personal Practice Actually Matters(08:22) Your Personal Impact Portfolio(09:38) The Reallocation Exercise(10:40) Addressing the Predictable Objections(11:41) The Call to Action(12:10) The Bottom Line--- First published: September 10th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/u9WzAcyZkBhgWAew5/your-sacrifice-portfolio-is-probably-terrible --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This post is based on a memo I wrote for this year's Meta Coordination Forum. See also Arden Koehler's recent post, which hits a lot of similar notes. Summary The EA movement stands at a crossroads. In light of AI's very rapid progress, and the rise of the AI safety movement, some people view EA as a legacy movement set to fade away; others think we should refocus much more on “classic” cause areas like global health and animal welfare. I argue for a third way: EA should embrace the mission of making the transition to a post-AGI society go well, significantly expanding our cause area focus beyond traditional AI safety. This means working on neglected areas like AI welfare, AI character, AI persuasion and epistemic disruption, human power concentration, space governance, and more (while continuing work on global health, animal welfare, AI safety, and biorisk). These additional [...] ---Outline:(00:20) Summary(02:38) Three possible futures for the EA movement(07:07) Reason #1: Neglected cause areas(10:49) Reason #2: EA is currently intellectually adrift(13:08) Reason #3: The benefits of EA mindset for AI safety and biorisk(14:53) This isn't particularly Will-idiosyncratic(15:57) Some related issues(16:10) Principles-first EA(17:30) Cultivating vs growing EA(21:27) PR mentality(24:48) What I'm not saying(28:31) What to do?(29:00) Local groups(31:26) Online(35:18) Conferences(36:05) Conclusion--- First published: October 10th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/R8AAG4QBZi5puvogR/effective-altruism-in-the-age-of-agi --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Here's a talk I gave at an EA university group organizers’ retreat recently, which I've been strongly encouraged to share on the forum. I'd like to make it clear I don't recommend or endorse everything discussed in this talk (one example in particular which hopefully will be self-evident), but do think serious shifts in how we engage with ethics and EA would be quite beneficial for the world. Part 1: Taking ethics seriously To set context for this talk, I want to go through an Our World in Data style birds-eye view of how things are trending across key issues often discussed in EA. This is to help get better intuitions for questions like “How well will the future go by default?” and “Is the world on track to eventually solve the most pressing problems?” - which can inform high-level strategy questions like “Should we generally be doing more [...] ---Outline:(00:32) Part 1: Taking ethics seriously(04:26) Incentive shifts and moral progress(05:07) What is incentivized by society?(07:08) Heroic Responsibility(11:30) Excerpts from Strangers drowning(14:37) Opening our eyes to what is unbearable(18:07) Increasing effectiveness vs. increasing altruism(20:20) Cognitive dissonance(21:27) Paragons of moral courage(23:15) The monk who set himself on fire to protect Buddhism, and didn't flinch an inch(27:46) What do I most deeply want to honour in this life?(29:43) Moral Courage and defending EA(31:55) Acknowledging opportunity cost and grappling with guilt(33:33) Part 2: Enjoying the process(33:38) Celebrating what's really beautiful - what our hearts care about(42:08) Enjoying effective altruism(44:43) Training our minds to cultivate the qualities we endorse(46:54) Meditation isnt a silver bullet(52:35) The timeless words of MLK--- First published: October 4th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/gWyvAQztk75xQvRxD/taking-ethics-seriously-and-enjoying-the-process --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

TL;DR - AIM's applicants skew towards global health & development. We’ve recommended four new animal welfare charities, have the capacity to launch all four, but expect to struggle to find the talent to do so. If you’ve considered moving into animal welfare work, applying to Charity Entrepreneurship to launch a new charity in the space could be of huge counterfactual value. Part 1: Why you should launch an animal welfare charity Our existing animal charities have had a lot of impact—improving the lives of over 1 billion animals worldwide. - from Shrimp Welfare Project securing corporate commitments globally and featuring on the Daily Show, to FarmKind's recent success coordinating a $2 million dollar fundraiser for the animal movement on the Dwarkshesh podcast, not to mention the progress of the 40 person army at the Fish Welfare Initiative, Scale Welfare's direct hand-on work at fish farms, and Animal Policy [...] ---Outline:(00:37) Part 1: Why you should launch an animal welfare charity(02:07) A few notes on counterfactual founder value(05:57) Part 2 - The Charity Entrepreneurship Program & Our Latest Animal Welfare Ideas(06:04) What is the Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program?(06:47) Our recommended animal welfare ideas for 2026(07:10) 1. Driving supermarket commitments to shift diets away from meat(07:58) 2. Securing scale-up funding for the alternative protein industry(08:51) 3. Cage-free farming in the Middle East(09:30) 4. Preventing painful injuries in laying hens(10:02) Applications close on October 5th: Apply here.--- First published: September 29th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/aeky2EWd32bjjPJqf/charity-entrepreneurship-is-bottlenecked-by-a-lack-of-great --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Summary: Consumers rejected genetically modified crops, and I expect they will do the same for cultivated meat. The meat lobby will fight to discredit the new technology, and as consumers are already primed to believe it's unnatural, it won’t be difficult to persuade them. When I hear people talk about cultivated meat (i.e. lab-grown meat) and how it will replace traditional animal agriculture, I find it depressingly reminiscent of the techno-optimists of the 1980s and ‘90s speculating about how genetic modification will solve all our food problems. The optimism of the time was understandable: in 1994 the first GMO product was introduced to supermarkets, and the benefits of the technology promised incredible rewards. GMOs were predicted to bring about the end of world hunger, all while requiring less water, pesticides, and land.Today, thirty years later, in the EU GM foods are so regulated that they are [...] ---Outline:(01:56) Why did GMOs fail to be widely adopted?(02:44) A Bad First Impression(05:54) Unpopular Corporate Concentration(07:22) Cultivated Meat IS GMO(08:45) What timeline are we in?(10:24) What can be done to prevent cultivated meat from becoming irrelevant?(10:30) Expect incredible opposition(11:46) Be ready to tell a clear story about the benefits.(13:17) A proactive PR Effort(15:01) First impressions matter(17:16) Labeling(19:35) Be ready to discuss concerns about unnaturalness(21:56) Limitations of the comparison(23:07) Conclusion--- First published: September 22nd, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/rMQA9w7ZM7ioZpaN6/cultivated-meat-a-wakeup-call-for-optimists --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Note: I am the web programme director at 80,000 Hours and the view expressed here currently helps shape the web team's strategy. However, this shouldn't be taken to be expressing something on behalf of 80k as a whole, and writing and posting this memo was not undertaken as an 80k project. 80,000 Hours, where I work, has made helping people make AI go well [1]its focus. As part of this work, I think my team should continue to: Talk about / teach ideas and thinking styles that have historically been central to effective altruism (e.g. via our career guide, cause analysis content, and podcasts) Encourage people to get involved in the EA community explicitly and via linking to content. I wrote this memo for the MCF (Meta Coordination Forum), because I wasn't sure this was intuitive to others. I think talking about EA ideas and encouraging people to get [...] ---Outline:(01:21) 1. The effort to make AGI go well needs people who are flexible and equipped to to make their own good decisions(02:10) Counterargument: Agendas are starting to take shape, so this is less true than it used to be.(02:43) 2. Making AGI go well calls for a movement that thinks in explicitly moral terms(03:59) Counterargument: movements can be morally good without being explicitly moral, and being morally good is whats important.(04:41) 3. EA is (A) at least somewhat able to equip people to flexibly make good decisions, (B) explicitly morally focused.(04:52) (A) EA is at least somewhat able to equip people to flexibly make good decisions(06:04) (B) EA is explicitly morally focused(06:49) Counterargument: A different flexible & explicitly moral movement could be better for trying to make AGI go well.(07:49) Appendix: What are the relevant alternatives?(12:13) Appendix 2: anon notes from others--- First published: September 25th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/oPue7R3outxZaTXzp/why-i-think-capacity-building-to-make-agi-go-well-should --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Intro and summary “How many chickens spared from cages is worth not being with my parents as they get older?!” - Me, exasperated (September 18, 2021) This post is about something I haven’t seen discussed on the EA forum but I often talk about with my friends in their mid 30s. It's about something I wish I'd understood better ten years ago: if you are ~25 and debating whether to move to an EA Hub, you are probably underestimating how much the calculus will change when you’re ~35, largely related to having kids and aging parents. Since this is underappreciated, moving to an EA Hub, and building a life there, can lead to tougher decisions later that can sneak up on you. If you’re living in an EA hub, or thinking about moving, this post explores reasons you might want to head home as you get older, different ways [...] ---Outline:(00:11) Intro and summary(01:49) Why move to an EA Hub in the first place?(02:57) How things change as you get older(05:33) Why YOU might be more likely to feel the pull to head home(06:49) How did I decide? How should you decide?(08:38) Consolation prize - moving to a Hub isn't all or nothing(09:38) Conclusion--- First published: September 23rd, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ZEWE6K74dmzv7kXHP/moving-to-a-hub-getting-older-and-heading-home --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

It's been several years since I was an EA student group organiser, so please forgive any part of this post which feels out of touch (& correct me in comments!) Wow, student group organising is hard. A few structural things that make it hard to be an organiser: You maybe haven’t had a job before, or have only had kind of informal jobs. So, you might not have learned a lot of stuff about how to accomplish things at work. You’re probably trying to do a degree at the same time, which is hard enough on its own! You don’t have the structure and benefits provided by a regular 9-5 job at an organisation, like: A manager An office Operational support People you can ask for help & advice A network You have, at most, a year or so to skill up before you might be responsible [...] --- First published: September 12th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/zMBFSesYeyfDp6Fj4/student-group-organising-is-hard-and-important --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Hi, have you been rejected from all the 80K listed EA jobs you’ve applied for? It sucks, right? Welcome to the club. What might be comforting is that you (and I) are not alone. EA Job listings are extremely competitive, and in the classic EA career path, you just get rejected over and over. Many others have written about their rejection experience, here, here, and here. Even if it is quite normal for very smart, hardworking, proactive, and highly motivated EAs to get rejected from high-impact positions, it still sucks. It sucks because we sincerely want to make the world a radically better place. We’ve read everything, planned accordingly, gone through fellowships, rejected other options, and worked very hard just to get the following message: "Thank you for your interest in [Insert EA Org Name]... we have decided to move forward with other candidates for this role... we're unfortunately [...] ---Outline:(06:13) A note on AI timelines(08:51) Time to go forward--- First published: September 5th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/pzbtpZvL2bYfssdkr/rejected-from-all-the-ea-jobs-you-applied-for-what-to-do-now --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Early work on ”GiveWell for AI Safety” Intro EA was founded on the principle of cost-effectiveness. We should fund projects that do more with less, and more generally, spend resources as efficiently as possible. And yet, while much interest, funding, and resources in EA have shifted towards AI safety, it's rare to see any cost-effectiveness calculations. The focus on AI safety is based on vague philosophical arguments that the future could be very large and valuable, and thus whatever is done towards this end is worth orders of magnitude more than most short-term effects. Even if AI safety is the most important problem, you should still strive to optimize how resources are spent to achieve maximum impact, since there are limited resources. Global health organizations and animal welfare organizations work hard to measure cost-effectiveness, evaluate charities, make sure effects are counterfactual, run RCTs, estimate moral weights, scope out interventions [...] ---Outline:(00:11) Early work on GiveWell for AI Safety(00:16) Intro(02:43) Step 1: Gathering data(03:00) Viewer minutes(03:35) Costs and revenue(04:49) Results(05:08) Step 2: Quality-adjusting(05:40) Quality of Audience (Qa)(06:58) Fidelity of Message (Qf)(08:05) Alignment of Message (Qm)(08:53) Results(09:37) Observations(12:37) How to help(13:36) Appendix: Examples of Data Collection(13:42) Rob Miles(14:18) AI Species (Drew Spartz)(14:56) Rational Animations(15:32) AI in Context(15:52) Cognitive Revolution--- First published: September 12th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/SBsGCwkoAemPawfJz/how-cost-effective-are-ai-safety-youtubers --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

There's a huge amount of energy spent on how to get the most QALYs/$. And a good amount of energy spent on how to increase total $. And you might think that across those efforts, we are succeeding in maximizing total QALYs. I think a third avenue is under investigated: marginally improving the effectiveness of ineffective capital. That's to say, improving outcomes, only somewhat, for the pool of money that is not at all EA-aligned. This cash is not being spent optimally, and likely never will be. But the sheer volume could make up for the lack of efficacy. Say you have the option to work for the foundation of one of two donors: Donor A only has an annual giving budget of $100,000, but will do with that money whatever you suggest. If you say “bed nets” he says “how many”. Donor B has a much larger [...] ---Outline:(01:34) Most money is not EA money(04:32) How much money is there?(05:49) Effective Everything?--- First published: September 8th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/o5LBbv9bfNjKxFeHm/marginally-more-effective-altruism --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Note: This post was crossposted from the Open Philanthropy Farm Animal Welfare Research Newsletter by the Forum team, with the author's permission. The author may not see or respond to comments on this post. How I decided what to say — and what not to I’m excited to share my TED talk. Here I want to share the story of how the talk came to be, and the three biggest decisions I struggled with in drafting it. The backstory Last fall, I posted on X about Trump's new Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, vowing to undo state bans on the sale of pork from crated pigs. I included an image of a pig in a crate. Liv Boeree, a poker champion and past TED speaker, saw that post and was haunted by it. She told me that she couldn’t get the image of the crated pig out of her [...] --- First published: September 5th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/XjQr52eDkBPLrLHB3/my-ted-talk --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

TL;DR: If a (meta) org had a meaningful impact on you (in line with what they hope to achieve), you should probably tell them. It is essential for their impact reporting, which is essential for them to continue operating. You are likely underestimating just how valuable your story is to them. It could be thousands of dollars worth. Thanks to Toby Tremlett, Lauren Mee and Sofia Balderson for reviewing a draft version of this post. All mistakes are my own. 1. Many organisations shaped my career — yet I usually only shared my story when prompted. In reflecting on my career journey, I was reminded of all the organizations who led me to where I am. I believe I reported their counterfactual contribution back to them, but this was not usually by my own doing. In two cases, I was personally reached out to - in one case, I [...] --- First published: August 8th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/3v6kghxMttEhbK3dT/consider-thanking-whoever-helped-you --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Context: I’m a senior fellow at Conservation X Labs (CXL), and I’m seeking support as I attempt to establish a program on humane rodent fertility control in partnership with the Wild Animal Initiative (WAI) and the Botstiber Institute for Wildlife Fertility Control (BIWFC). CXL is a biodiversity conservation organization working in sustainable technologies, not an animal welfare organization. However, CXL leadership is interested in simultaneously promoting biodiversity conservation and animal welfare, and they are excited about the possibility of advancing applied research that make it possible to ethically limit rodent populations to protect biodiversity. I think this represents the wild animal welfare community's first realistic opportunity to bring conservation organizations into wild animal welfare work while securing substantial non-EA funding for welfare-improving interventions. Background Rodenticides cause immense suffering to (likely) hundreds of millions of rats and mice annually through anticoagulation-induced death over several days, while causing significant non-target [...] ---Outline:(01:08) Background(02:20) Why this approach?(03:49) Why CXL?(06:03) Why now, and why me?(06:59) Budget(07:52) Next steps--- First published: August 27th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/EcBjr4Q2AtoTLcKXp/high-impact-and-urgent-funding-opportunity-rodent-fertility --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

I told someone recently I would respect them if they only worked 40 hours a week, instead of their current 50-60. What I really meant was stronger than that. I respect people who do the most impactful work they can — whether they work 70 hours a week because they can, 30 hours so they can be home with their kid, or 15 hours because of illness or burnout. I admire those who go above and beyond. But I don’t expect that of everyone. Working long hours isn’t required to earn my respect, nor do I think it should be the standard that we hold as a community. I want it to be okay to say "that doesn't work for me". It feels like donations: I admire people who give away 50%, but I don’t expect it. I still deeply respect someone who gives 10% to the [...] --- First published: August 26th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/qFsqawmgRjxXkA7eF/you-re-enough --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

How to prevent infighting, mitigate status races, and keep your people focused. Cross-posted from my Substack. Organizational culture changes rapidly at scale. When you add new people to an org, they’ll bring in their own priors about how to operate, how to communicate, and what sort of behavior is looked-up to. Despite rapid changes, in this post I explain how you can implement anti-fragile cultural principles—principles that help your team fix their own problems, often arising from growth and scale, and help the org continue to do what made it successful in the first place. This is based partially on my experience at Wave, which grew to 2000+ people, but also tons of other reading (top recommendations: Peopleware by DeMarco and Lister, Swarmwise by Rick Falkvinge, High Growth Handbook by Elad Gil, The Secret of Our Success by Henrich, Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, as well as Brian [...] ---Outline:(01:13) Common Problems(05:00) Write down your culture(06:25) That said, you don't have to write everything down(08:37) Anti-fragile values I recommend(09:02) Mission First(10:51) Focus(11:32) Fire Fast(12:58) Feedback for everything(13:50) Mutual Trust(15:48) Work sustainably and avoid burnout(17:42) Write only what's new & helpful--- First published: August 21st, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/mLonxtAiuvvkjXiwq/the-anti-fragile-culture --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This is a link post. There are some moments of your life when the reality of suffering really hits home. Visiting desperately poor parts of the world for the first time. Discovering what factory farming actually looks like after a childhood surrounded by relatively idyllic rural farming. Realising too late that you shouldn’t have clicked on that video of someone experiencing a cluster headache. Or, more unexpectedly, having a baby. One of 10^20 Birth Stories This Year With my relaxed and glowing pregnant wife in her 34th week, I expect things to go smoothly. There have been a few warning signs: some slightly anomalous results in the early tests, the baby in breech position, and some bleeding. But everything still seems to be going relatively well. Then, suddenly, while walking on an idyllic French seafront, she says: "I think my waters have broken". "Really? It's probably nothing, let's [...] ---Outline:(00:39) One of 10^20 Birth Stories This Year(03:51) The Beginning of Experience(05:38) Is This Almost Everything?(08:17) Schrödinger's baby(12:58) On Feeling the Right Things(14:59) Into The Fifth  Trimester(16:40) The Most Beautiful Case For Net-Negativity--- First published: August 21st, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/6PuBTer69ZJvTDNQk/most-of-the-world-is-an-adorably-suffering-debatably-1 Linkpost URL:https://torchestogether.substack.com/p/most-of-the-world-is-an-adorably --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

My new book, Altruismo racional, is now on presale. It is my attempt at presenting a compelling case for a particular strand of "classical EA"[1]: one that emphasizes caring deeply about global health and poverty, a rational approach to giving, the importance of cost-effectiveness, and the 🔸10% Pledge. In this post, I provide some context on my reasons for writing this book and what I hope to achieve. If “new EA-themed book in Spanish” was all you needed to know, feel free to skip to How you can help or preorder now. Why write a book Imagine you wake up one morning and discover the world has changed in a few peculiar ways. There has been no 10th anniversary edition of Peter Singer's The Life You Can Save—it was last edited more than a decade ago and has been out of print for years. Will MacAskill has not written [...] ---Outline:(00:54) Why write a book(03:18) What the book is about(04:54) Why this particular topic(06:32) Expected impact  Dream scenario(08:39) How you can help(08:42) Buy the book for yourself or others(09:05) Preorder if the current availability works for you(09:46) Or get notified by email as soon as your preferred format is available in your country(10:02) A note on bulk purchases(10:36) Help me reach more people(11:01) Acknowledgements--- First published: August 20th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ak3McTxHTojjn6sqH/new-spanish-language-book-on-classical-ea --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Note: This post was crossposted from the Open Philanthropy Farm Animal Welfare Research Newsletter by the Forum team, with the author's permission. The author may not see or respond to comments on this post. Why ending the worst abuses of factory farming is an issue ripe for moral reform I recently joined Dwarkesh Patel's podcast to discuss factory farming. I hope you’ll give it a listen — and consider supporting his fundraiser for FarmKind's Impact Fund. (Dwarkesh is matching all donations up to $250K; use the code “dwarkesh”.) We discuss two contradictory views about factory farming that produce the same conclusion: that its end is either inevitable or impossible. Some techno-optimists assume factory farming will vanish in the wake of AGI. Some pessimists see reforming it as a hopeless cause. Both camps arrive at the same conclusion: fatalism. If factory farming is destined to end, or persist, then what's [...] --- First published: August 8th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/HiGmRwq4YiDzggRLH/not-inevitable-not-impossible --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. ---Images from the article:Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

I’m a long-time GiveWell donor and an ethical vegan. In a recent GiveWell podcast on livelihoods programs, providing animals as “productive assets” was mentioned as a possible program type. After reaching out to GiveWell directly to voice my objection, I was informed that because GiveWell's moral weights currently don’t include nonhuman animals, animal-based aid is not categorically off the table if it surpasses their cost-effectiveness bar. Older posts on the GiveWell website similarly do not rule out animal donations from an ethical lens. In response to some of the rationale GiveWell shared with me, I also want to proactively address a core ethical distinction: Animal-aid programs involve certain, programmatic harm to animals (breeding, confinement, separation of families, slaughter). Human-health programs like malaria prevention have, at most, indirect and uncertain effects on animal consumption (by saving human lives), which can change over time (e.g., cultural shifts, plant-based/cultivated options). Constructive [...] --- First published: August 14th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/YnL6prYQbaLz22mxe/psa-for-vegan-donors-givewell-not-ruling-out-animal-based --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.