Effective Altruism: Morality by numbers
Origin Story
Introduction
A discussion on the history of effective altruism and its connection to Sam Bankman Free, the failed CEO of FTX, exploring its utilitarian philosophy and how it became involved in a major scam.
In the last episode of season four, Ian Dunt and Dorian Lynskey discuss effective altruism. Last month the US entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried was convicted on multiple counts of fraud and conspiracy related to the dramatic collapse of his cryptocurrency exchange FTX. Bankman-Fried was also a prominent advocate of effective altruism, a philanthropic movement based on utilitarian philosophy, and the scandal has thrown the EA community into crisis.
Dorian and Ian explain how two maverick young Oxford philosophers ended up creating a multi-billion-dollar movement, explore the ideas behind it, and track its journey towards long termism: the philosophy of safeguarding the future of the human race from threats such as hostile AI. Are the principles of EA sound? Did the influx of billionaires and the obsession with existential risk knock it off course? Was Bankman-Fried a true believer who blew it or just a grifter who took the idealists for a ride? And can EA survive one of the biggest financial scandals of this century? When big ideas collide with big money and big tech, things get messy.
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Reading list
Books:
Carol J.Adams, Alice Crary, Lori Gruen, (eds.) — The Good it Promises, the Harm it Does: Critical Essays on Effective Alturism, (2023)
Nick Bostrom and Milan M. Ćirković (eds.) — Global Catastrophic Risks
(2008)
Nick Bostrom — Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies (2014)
Zeke Faux — Number Go Up: Inside Crypto’s Wild Rise and Staggering
Fall (2023)
John Leslie — The End of the World: The Science and Ethics of Human
Extinction (1996)
Michael Lewis — Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon (2023)
William MacAskill — Doing Good Better: Effective Altruism and How You
Can Make a Difference (2015)
William MacAskill — What We Owe the Future (2022)
Toby Ord — The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity
(2020)
Online:
Core EA Principles, Centre for Effective Altruism
Peter Singer — Famine, Affluence and Morality, 1971
William MacAskill — The history of the term ‘effective altruism’, Effective
Raffi Khatchadourian — The Doomsday Invention, New Yorker, 2015
Gideon-Lewis Krauss — The Reluctant Prophet of Effective Altruism, New
Charlotte Alter — Effective Altruist Leaders Were Repeatedly Warned
About Sam Bankman-Fried Years Before FTX Collapsed, Time, 2023
Sophie McBain — Sam Bankman-Fried and the effective altruism delusion,
Podcasts:
80,000 Hours: Sam Bankman-Fried, 2022
Written and presented by Dorian Lynskey and Ian Dunt. Audio production by Simon Williams. Music by Jade Bailey. Logo art by Mischa Welsh. Lead Producer is Anne-Marie Luff. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. Origin Story is a Podmasters production.
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