Effective altruism is a philosophy and a community focused on answering the question, “How can we best use our resources to help others?” Said another way, effective altruism is about using evidence and careful reasoning to take actions that help others as much as possible.
It’s partly a research field, which aims to identify the world’s most pressing problems and the best solutions to them, and it’s partly a practical community that aims to use those findings to do good.
Learn more
- Introduction to Effective Altruism (article; ~20-minute read)
- “Effective Altruism: An Introduction” (10-episode podcast series)
- The Effective Altruism “Handbook”
- EffectiveAltruism.org
Resources for using your career to help solve the world’s most pressing problems
- 80,000 Hours (articles, a popular podcast, and a frequently-updated job board)
Resources for identifying highly effective charities
- One for the World
- GiveWell
- Giving What We Can
- The Life You Can Save
- Open Philanthropy: Research Reports
Related books
- What We Owe The Future by William MacAskill (2022)
- The Precipice by Toby Ord (2020)
- The Alignment Problem by Brian Christian (2020)
- Doing Good Better by William MacAskill (2016)
- Strangers Drowning by Larissa MacFarquhar (2016)
- The Most Good You Can Do by Peter Singer (2015)
- Global Catastrophic Risks by Nick Bostrom (ed.) (2011)
- The Life You Can Save by Peter Singer (2009)
- Living High and Letting Die by Peter Unger (1996)
- Famine, Affluence, and Morality by Peter Singer (1972)