EA Talks

Rethink Priorities is a research organization dedicated to conducting research on neglected causes. Over the past year, they’ve developed a track record of high-quality research in the areas of farmed animal welfare, wild animal welfare, and risks from nuclear weapons. Co-founder Marcus Davis discusses the organization’s approach to producing valuable research, with specific reference to their work on animal welfare.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

How likely is human extinction due to climate change? Neil Bowerman, a former climate physicist who is now at 80,000 Hours, addresses one component of this question — the future physical habitability of Earth — by surveying possible routes to extreme levels of warming and ways in which extreme warming could lead to uninhabitability.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

The term “transformative AI” (TAI) describes AI that precipitates a major societal transition. Ross Gruetzemacher, a PhD candidate at Auburn University and a data scientist, unpacks the notion of TAI, proposing a distinction between TAI and radically transformative AI (RTAI). He also discusses the relationship between TAI and RTAI, and whether we should expect a period of TAI to precede RTAI. This analysis could help guide EA discussions about how to allocate resources toward mitigating the most extreme impacts of AI.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

Cash transfers are a popular strategy for poverty reduction. But how do their results compare to those of more traditional programs? In this talk, Sam Carter, a senior policy associate at J-PAL, shares evidence from impact evaluations spanning a set of countries that have directly compared cash transfers to other interventions. She also discusses how their impacts differ, as well as the most appropriate contexts in which to implement transfer programs.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

The graduates of Charity Entrepreneurship’s Incubation Program introduce their new organizations in a series of lightning talks. The speakers, organizations, and topics are: Haven King-Nobles of the Fish Welfare Initiative, on reducing the suffering of billions of fish through researching and executing targeted, highly-scalable welfare interventionsLauren Mee of Animal Advocacy Careers, on finding the most effective ways to encourage skilled individuals into high-impact animal organizationsCaleb Parikh of Good Policies, on improving public health policy in low- and middle-income countries to bring impact at scaleMichael Plant and Clare Donaldson of the Happier Lives Institute, on researching the most cost-effective interventions to increase happiness and subjective well-beingJoel Burke of Policy Entrepreneurship Network, on figuring out which policies can do the most good and ensuring that they’re implemented, starting with tobacco taxesFiona Conlon and Varsha Venugopal of Suvita, on increasing healthcare utilization by focusing on vaccination rates in IndiaThis talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

Research has always been an important part of the effective altruism community. What can we learn from successful research teams outside of EA about setting up organizations capable of making important breakthroughs and profoundly shaping society? Stefan Torges, a co-executive director of the Effective Altruism Foundation, summarizes the academic literature on this question and presents case studies of specific teams.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

If all goes well, human history is just beginning. Our species could survive for billions of years, reaching heights of flourishing unimaginable today. But this vast future is at risk. We have gained the power to destroy ourselves, and all our potential, forever, and we haven’t yet gained the wisdom to ensure that we don’t. Toby Ord, an Oxford moral philosopher and research fellow at the Future of Humanity Institute, expands on these ideas and discusses adopting the perspective of humanity — one of the major themes of his forthcoming book.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

The Open Wing Alliance (OWA) is a global coalition of 70+ organizations that are working to change the way the world’s biggest companies treat animals. Alexandria Beck, director of the OWA, explains how the coalition is spreading its ideas across cultures in its quest to set a new standard for corporate animal welfare policies in every major market.This talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: London. Find out how to attend a future EA Global conference: https://www.eaglobal.org/.Learn more about effective altruism: https://www.effectivealtruism.org/.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

Many people in the EA community hope to make the world better by influencing events in the far future. But if the future can potentially contain an infinite number of lives, and infinite total moral value, we face major challenges in understanding the impact of our actions and justifying any particular strategy. In this academic session, Hayden Wilkinson discusses how we might be able to face these challenges — even if it means abandoning some of our moral principles in the process.To learn more about effective altruism, visit effectivealtruism.orgThis talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: San Francisco. You can learn more about these conferences at eaglobal.orgOriginal VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.

Popular models for the effects of climate change human welfare usually focus on its long-term economic impacts — but often leave out its impact on human mortality.R. Daniel Bressler, a PhD candidate in Columbia University’s Sustainable Development program, extended one such model to include mortality costs, and found that this significantly increased the model’s estimate for the welfare consequences of climate change. In this academic session, he discusses this work, and explains how a similar approach could help us model welfare costs for global catastrophic risks like nuclear war and pandemics.To learn more about effective altruism, visit effectivealtruism.orgThis talk was filmed at EA Global 2019: San Francisco. You can learn more about these conferences at eaglobal.org.Original VideoEffective Altruism is a social movement dedicated to finding ways to do the most good possible, whether through charitable donations, career choices, or volunteer projects. EA Global conferences are gatherings for EAs to meet. You can also listen to this talk along with its accompanying video on YouTube.