EA Forum Podcast (All audio)

Epistemic Status: I think this is a real issue, and think the importance of the issue varies significantly by introductory experience/facilitator. TLDR EA introductions present the movement as cause-neutral, but newcomers discover that most funding and opportunities actually focus on longtermism (especially biosecurity and AI) This creates a "bait and switch" problem where people join expecting balanced cause prioritization but find stark funding hierarchies The solution is honest upfront communication about EA's current priorities rather than pretending to be more cause-neutral than we actually are We should update intro fellowship curricula to include transparent data about funding distribution and encourage open discussion about whether EA's shift toward longtermism represents rational updating or cultural bias 1. The Problem (Personal Experience) In EA Bath, we have a group member, who's exactly the kind of person you'd want in EA - agentic, impact-minded, thoughtful about doing good. They had her [...] ---Outline:(00:22) TLDR(01:03) 1. The Problem (Personal Experience)(02:49) 2. The Evidence(03:02) Conference and organisational focus(03:45) The engagement effect(04:22) Community dissatisfaction(04:44) Ideological tendencies(05:18) Career advice concentration(06:05) 3. Why This Matters + What Honest Introductions Could Look Like(06:17) The bait and switch problem(07:22) What honest introductions could look like(08:28) A concrete, scalable approach - Updating the Intro Fellowship(09:37) 4. Objections & Responses(09:40) This creates selection bias for people who already agree with EA priorities(10:21) There isnt time for this level of nuance(10:56) This will put people off who might otherwise contribute(11:21) We cant possibly mention every cause area people might care about(11:50) 5. Conclusion--- First published: May 29th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/FwybRtbHyym7e3Xus/should-ea-introductions-be-more-transparent-about-the-state --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Emma Buckland, Program Associate in Farm Animal Welfare, drafts a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation for her colleagues. This post was written by Open Philanthropy Global Health and Wellbeing Staff. Original blog post here. At Open Philanthropy, our mission is to help others as much as we can with the resources available to us. When making tough calls about which grants will help the most, we rely on a tool that helps clarify expected impact: back-of-the-envelope calculations, or BOTECs. BOTECs are rough quantitative models that estimate potential grants’ social return on investment (SROI). Open Phil program staff use them to compare a grant's expected benefits to its estimated costs. Despite the name, most BOTECs wouldn’t actually fit on the back of an envelope. They often involve dozens of assumptions, nested calculations, and scenario planning — especially when we’re modeling larger grants or entire focus areas.Staff across our Global Health and Wellbeing [...] ---Outline:(01:46) What BOTECs can (and can't) tell us(03:15) Sample BOTECs(03:46) Trialing statins for treating tuberculosis(10:05) Reducing the cost of pXRF screening(15:55) Supporting a fundraising organization for effective charities(17:30) Improving conditions for broiler chickensThe original text contained 21 footnotes which were omitted from this narration. --- First published: May 28th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/wxzZQSes2YrXoBDqu/how-we-use-back-of-the-envelope-calculations-in-our --- 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.

In my previous post in this series, I estimated that we have 3 researchers for every advocate working on US AI governance, and I argued that this ratio is backwards. When allocating staff, you almost always want to have more people working on the more central activity. I argued that in the case of AI policy, the central activity is advocacy, not research, because the core problem to be solved is fixing the bad private incentives faced by AI developers. As I explained, the problem with these incentives is less that they’re poorly understood, and more that they require significant political effort to overturn. As a result, we’ll need to shift significant resources from research (which helps us understand problems better) to advocacy (which helps us change bad incentives). In this post, I want to explain why it's appropriate for us to shift these resources now, rather than [...] ---Outline:(02:24) OUR BEST POLICIES OFFER POSITIVE EXPECTED VALUE(04:42) We've Already Laid a Philosophical Foundation for AI Governance(11:54) Regulations Won't Backfire by Pushing Companies Overseas(13:59) Regulation Is Helpful Even If It's Not Fully Future-Proof(19:22) Regulations Don't Have to Lead to Oligopoly(23:14) Regulations Won't Significantly Promote Nationalization(27:32) ADVOCATING FOR POLICIES NOW MAKES THEM MORE LIKELY TO PASS(27:37) Advocacy Won't Offend Politicians(30:59) Advocacy Isn't Useless(33:37) Political Opposition Can't Be Avoided by Delay(38:42) Improving Advocacy Skills Requires Practice(43:12) WE CAN INCREASE THE SUPPLY OF ADVOCATES(43:47) Generously Fund Existing Advocacy Groups(47:15) Use Headhunters(49:14) Aggressively Train New Advocates(51:37) WE DONT HAVE THE LUXURY OF WAITING--- First published: May 28th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ixfE7JZy4RYehJW6C/shift-resources-to-advocacy-now-post-4-of-6-on-ai-governance --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Summary I’m excited to announce a “Digital Sentience Consortium” hosted by Longview Philanthropy, in collaboration with The Navigation Fund and Macroscopic Ventures, to support research and applied projects focused on the potential consciousness, sentience, moral status, and experiences of artificial intelligence systems. The opportunities include research fellowships, career transition fellowships, and a broad request for proposals for applied work on these topics. For years, I’ve thought this area was seriously overlooked. It now has growing interest. Twenty-two out of 123 pages of Claude 4's model card are about its potential moral patienthood. Scientific experts increasingly say that near-term AI sentience is a real possibility; even the skeptical neuroscientist Anil Seth says, “it is unwise to dismiss the possibility altogether.” We’re hoping to bring new people and projects into the field to increase the chance that society deals with the possibility of digital sentience reasonably, and with concern for [...] ---Outline:(00:14) Summary(01:28) Motivation & Focus(04:22) Three Funding Opportunities(04:29) Research Fellowships on Digital Sentience(05:30) Career Transition Fellowships on Digital Sentience(06:26) Request for Proposals: Applied Work on Potential Digital Sentience and Society(07:31) Application Process(07:53) Contact--- First published: May 28th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/uxcGTWxgAkewHeGam/digital-sentience-funding-opportunities-support-for-applied --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This is a memo I wrote for the 2025 Animal Advocacy Strategy Forum, which were encouraged to be highly opinionated to generate discussion on animal advocacy strategy. Genetically Improved Farmed Tilapia In 1980, the global population was approximately 4.5 billion and growing. There were emerging concerns about food and nutrition security with 28% of the global population undernourished. Fish was seen as key to combatting this challenge. More than 75% of the world's fish is consumed in developing countries. In 1988, WorldFish began the Genetically Improved Farmed Tilapia (GIFT) project aimed to develop a faster-growing strain of Nile tilapia, at an annual cost of $60-90k. By the end of 1997, a total of 553,350 GIFT fertilised fish eggs were disseminated to the Philippines, Bangladesh, China, Thailand, and Vietnam. GIFT is considered an International Public Good and is available to any country that agrees to responsibly use the GIFT they [...] ---Outline:(00:21) Genetically Improved Farmed Tilapia(01:59) GIF-X, Y, and ZThe original text contained 1 footnote which was omitted from this narration. --- First published: May 27th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/745DdeYLWebc89tty/gifting-breeder-animals-is-a-humanitarian-intervention --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

TL;DR – Individuals with technical backgrounds are well-positioned to advance AI safety policy in numerous ways. Opportunities include both A) technical research directions, including evals, compute governance mechanisms, infosec, and forecasting, and B) career paths for advancing AI policy, including policymaking and communication efforts. Contrary to what many people assume, most of these roles do not require extensive political backgrounds or unusually good social skills, and many technical people who aren’t currently considering these paths would be a good fit. This post aims to encourage such people to consider these options.Introduction Over the past couple years, there has been a substantial increase in enthusiasm in the AI safety community for addressing AI risk through policy or governance solutions. Yet despite growing excitement for more policy work to address AI risk, many people with technical backgrounds may underestimate their personal fit for contributing to this area. Moreover, there are [...] ---Outline:(00:53) Introduction(01:52) The current state of AI policy - proposals often lack sufficient details for implementation and policymakers often have insufficient technical understanding(04:26) People with technical backgrounds can help(05:24) Things you can work on(08:05) Technical research directions:(08:09) Technical Infrastructure for AI Governance(09:14) Evals(12:44) Compute governance mechanisms(17:02) Information security(19:12) Technical mechanisms for mitigating policy downsides(21:55) Strategic AI landscape analysis(22:30) Forecasting and other similar analysis(24:27) Macrostrategy/worldview investigation research(27:49) Career Paths:(28:12) USG policymaking pipeline(29:45) Executive branch jobs(33:35) Certain congressional staffer positions(35:58) Traditional think tanks(38:27) AI-risk focused governance and policy orgs(40:48) Non-USG policymaking pathways(41:09) Government policies in other countries(42:59) International policymaking(45:39) Corporate policymaking within AI companies(48:14) Communication efforts(48:46) Tech(-adjacent) journalism(49:53) Other media engagement(51:37) More direct stakeholder engagement(54:21) Other:(54:34) Support for any of the above (including earning to give)(56:59) Other things I haven't considered(57:35) Conclusion(58:55) Acknowledgement:The original text contained 10 footnotes which were omitted from this narration. --- First published: May 26th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/Y8epqQurrjtNENQj9/techies-wanted-how-stem-backgrounds-can-advance-safe-ai --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

1 Controversy (Crosspost of my blog article). Humans affect staggering numbers of wild animals. There are likely quadrillions fewer insects presently walking the face of the earth because of our activities. Most people don’t think this matters—assigning essentially zero weight to bugs. But for reasons I’ve given before at length, and thus won’t repeat here, I think these people are dead wrong. Wild animal suffering is literally the worst thing in the world. Every other present issue is a rounding error in comparison. In light of that, it's important to know how we humans, in the aggregate, affect wild animals. If humans harm wild animals dramatically, that makes increasing the human population a risky proposition. In contrast, if we benefit wild animals, that makes a strong case for a larger population. I’ve argued before that most wild animals live quite bad lives. Most creatures that will ever walk [...] ---Outline:(00:13) 1 Controversy(08:44) 2 Do mass extinctions have long-term effects?(18:39) 3 Does the world grow more diverse and productive in the wake of an apocalypse?(22:48) 4 Other points(23:14) 4.1 Strangelove oceans(23:51) 4.2 Climate change(26:49) 4.3 Extinction debt(28:47) 4.4 Space colonization/terraforming/other expansion of nature(30:51) 5 Conclusion--- First published: May 27th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/NNBuENfXKGPLSaBiw/long-run-human-impact-on-wild-animal-suffering-much-more --- 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.

From Effective Altruism, Lagos State University, we have this message for our fellow muslims: Islam teaches that animals are sentient communities created by Allah, deserving compassion and mercy as the Quran affirms animals form “communities like you” (Quran 6:38)  "There is no creature on earth nor a bird that flies with its wings but they are communities like yourselves."  — Qur'an 6:38 Prophet Muḥammad (ﷺ) repeatedly modelled kindness to animals: for example he rebuked Aisha when she strucks a stubborn camel, saying “You must be gentle…gentleness is not in anything except that it beautifies it…”  "Gentleness is not in  anything except  it beautifies it, and it is not removed from anything except that it disgraces it."  — Sahih Muslim Many narrations underscore that any kindness to animals is rewarded, while cruelty is condemned e.g In an authentic hadith, Prophet Muḥammad (ﷺ)  declared that “there is a reward for service [...] --- First published: May 26th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/jntneaMQDCS4z7TtG/untitled-draft-bbcd --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This is a link post. From a vlogbrothers video by Hank Green comes the most EA-flavored framing from a non-EA I've ever seen. In the following quote from the video he's referencing the work done by Partners in Health and supported by the YouTube community that exists around him, his brother John Green, and the work they do. More information on that project is in another recent video. I think about this in the context of this community's work in Sierra Leone: already fewer women are dying in childbirth, and that victory is so quiet. If 3,000 women in West Africa were trapped in a fallen building, there would be international news stories about it; there would be outcry to save them. But if 30,000 women each have a 10% chance of dying in childbirth that's the same 3,000 deaths. But due to, I think, just the way the human [...] --- First published: May 27th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/4t3baKsdgkLEJvtXQ/hank-green-on-recognizing-invisible-prevention-and Linkpost URL:https://youtu.be/ndeB_BpsRGk?feature=shared --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

We’ve redesigned effectivealtruism.org to improve understanding and perception of effective altruism, and make it easier to take action. View the new site I led the redesign and will be writing in the first person here, but many others contributed research, feedback, writing, editing, and development. I’d love to hear what you think, here is a feedback form. Redesign goals This redesign is part of CEA's broader efforts to improve how effective altruism is understood and perceived. I focused on goals aligned with CEA's branding and growth strategy: Improve understanding of what effective altruism is Make the core ideas easier to grasp by simplifying language, addressing common misconceptions, and showcasing more real-world examples of people and projects. Improve the perception of effective altruism I worked from a set of brand associations defined by the group working on the EA brand project[1]. These are words we want people to associate [...] ---Outline:(00:44) Redesign goals(02:09) Before and after(02:22) Landing page(03:50) Site navigation(04:24) New Take action page(05:03) Early results(05:40) Share your thoughtsThe original text contained 1 footnote which was omitted from this narration. --- First published: May 27th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ZbQKtMMsDP6GnXuwr/revamped-effectivealtruism-org --- 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.