Effective Altruism Definitions Series

This sequence defines effective altruism in a way that’s anthropological. What do effective altruists believe that other people tend not to believe? Why do they believe that? What do the vegans and the kidney donors, the AI safety researchers and the randomized controlled trial lovers, have in common?

For ease of writing, I say “effective altruism says this” or “effective altruists believe that.” In reality, effective altruism is a diverse movement, and many effective altruists believe different things. And while I’m trying my best to describe the beliefs that are distinctive to the movement, no effective altruist (including me) believes everything I put in these posts. However, I still believe these posts can be useful.

I end up reducing effective altruism to four beliefs:

1. Don’t care about some strangers more than other strangers because of arbitrary group membership.
2. Think with numbers.
3. We don’t know what we’re doing—but we can figure it out together.
4. You can do hard things.