Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: AMA: Lewis Bollard, Program Director of Farm Animal Welfare at OpenPhil, published by tobytrem on May 1, 2024 on The Effective Altruism Forum.
This announcement was written by Toby Tremlett, but don't worry, I won't answer the questions for Lewis.
Lewis Bollard, Program Director of Farm Animal Welfare at Open Philanthropy, will be holding an AMA on Wednesday 8th of May. Put all your questions for him on this thread before Wednesday (you can add questions later, but he may not see them).
Lewis leads Open Philanthropy's Farm Animal Welfare Strategy, which you can read more about here. Open Philanthropy has given over 400 grants in its Farm Animal Welfare focus area, ranging from $15,000 to support animal welfare training for two veterinary researchers, to a three-year-long $13 million commitment to support Anima International.
Lewis has a BA in Social Studies from Harvard and a Law degree from Yale. Before starting at Open Philanthropy in 2015, he worked as, amongst other things, a Policy Advisor at the Humane Society of the United States.
Things I recommend reading/listening to to find out more about Lewis's work:
Lewis Bollard on the 7 most promising ways to end factory farming, and whether AI is going to be good or bad for animals - 80,000 Hours Podcast.
Lewis's previous Forum AMA.
A written interview with Current Affairs, outlining why Factory Farming is a moral priority.
Lewis's Farm Animal Welfare Research newsletter. Recent posts have been crossposted to the Forum as:
This is why we can't have nice laws
And Lessons from two pioneering advocates for farmed animals.
Consider asking Lewis about:
Lessons he has learned from historical activists.
How Open Philanthropy chooses its focus areas: why chicken and fish?
How you could most effectively help animals with your time or money.
What he's most excited about in the farm animal welfare space.
What he thinks is behind the decline in plant-based meat sales.
How he thinks about moral weights and tradeoffs between species.
How he thinks EA has influenced the animal welfare movement.
How he thinks AI may affect animal welfare.
How to build career capital for a career in animal welfare.
But, as always, ask him anything!
Thanks for listening. To help us out with The Nonlinear Library or to learn more, please visit nonlinear.org

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