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Which cause to work on? | Kit Harris Feb 05, 2021

Show notes

This is a talk for people who want to figure out which cause to work on and are just getting started in doing so.

Kit Harris leads on grant investigations and researches promising fields at Longview Philanthropy. He also writes about our recommendations and research for our philanthropists. Prior to focusing on high-impact philanthropic work, Kit worked as a credit derivatives trader with J.P. Morgan. During that time, he donated the majority of his income to high-impact charities. Kit holds a first class degree in mathematics from the University of Oxford.

This talk was taken from EA Student Summit 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

WANBAM: Our successes, challenges, and opportunities to get involved | Kathryn Mecrow-Flynn Feb 02, 2021

Show notes

Kathryn Mecrow-Flynn, the Founder and CEO of WANBAM, discusses the lessons learnt during WANBAM’s first year of operation. She talks about the opportunities for getting involved and the possibilities for similar mentorship schemes in the community.

Founded in 2019, WANBAM connects and supports a global network of women, trans people of any gender, and non-binary people interested in effective altruism through mentorship.

This talk was taken from EA Global Asia and Pacific 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

Dual moral obligations and international cooperation against global catastrophic risks | Jenny Xiao Jan 29, 2021

Show notes

The fight against global catastrophic risks (GCRs) requires international cooperation, yet it is often challenging to foster genuine collaboration among different countries. Jenny Xiao, a PhD student at Columbia University, reconceptualizes international cooperation decisions as a tradeoff between “dual moral obligations” towards the nation and humanity as a whole. How countries think about this tradeoff shapes their willingness to contribute to collective efforts against GCRs.

This talk was taken from EA Global Asia and Pacific 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

Fireside chat | Peter Singer Jan 26, 2021

Show notes

In this episode, Peter and Wanyi have a brief conversation about the direction of EA, movement building strategies, and how to feel about people who do not donate money.

Peter Singer has written, co-authored, edited or co-edited more than 40 books, including Animal Liberation, Practical Ethics, The Life You Can Save, and The Most Good You Can Do. His writings have inspired both the animal rights movement and effective altruism, and he is the founder of the charity The Life You Can Save.

This talk was taken from EA Global Asia and Pacific 2020. Click here to watch the talk on the Effective Altruism YouTube channel.

Using “Back of the Envelope Calculations” (BOTECs) to prioritize interventions | Zachary Robinson Jan 22, 2021

Show notes

Zach talks about why, when, and how to use “Back Of The Envelope Calculations” (BOTECs) to inform altruistic decision-making and walks through an example to demonstrate key concepts.

Zachary Robinson is a research fellow at open philanthropy. Open Philanthropy is an organization whose mission is to give as effectively as they can and share their findings openly so that anyone can build on their work. Through research and grantmaking, Open Philanthropy hopes to learn how to make philanthropy go especially far in terms of improving lives. They are passionate about maximizing the impact of our giving, and are excited to connect with other donors who share their passion.

This talk was taken from EA Global Student Summit 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

Expansion of animal advocacy and concern for wild animal suffering in India | Aditya SK Jan 19, 2021

Show notes

Aditya examines ways to expand animal advocacy in India; especially concern and research about wild animal suffering which has great potential for reducing aggregate suffering. Given the historically positive attitude of the Indian cultural and legal systems towards non-human animals, strategic outreach to advocates, academics and policy-makers by organizations like Animal Ethics could potentially influence structural changes to reduce the suffering of sentient beings in the wild.

Aditya is a coordinator at Animal Ethics. Animal Ethics is an organization that was formed to provide information and promote discussion and debate about issues in animal ethics, and to provide resources for animal advocates and the general public. Their work deals with the way nonhuman animals are considered in everyday life, as well as how they are considered in fields that affect human attitudes and activities that are relevant to animals. These include academia, scientific fields, and the law. Animal Ethics looks at the way nonhuman animals are impacted by current human activities, and how they might be impacted by future planned or unplanned human activities. This involves not only the ways we might harm them, but also how we might help them even when the cause of their plight is not human action.

This talk was taken from EA Global Asia and Pacific 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

Decoupling: a technique for reducing bias | David Manley Jan 15, 2021

Show notes

Overcoming confirmation bias in our thinking requires decoupling: evaluating the strength of new evidence independently from our prior views. David explains how to implement some easy cognitive techniques that have been shown to help us successfully decouple; and how even informal decoupling approximates Bayesian reasoning.

David Manley is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. His research has been mainly about semantics, ontology, probability, and evidence. But lately He has been thinking about conditions for rationality and well-being—not just for individual people, but also for groups, animals, and other cognitive systems.

This talk was taken from EA Student Summit 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

Outlook on the emerging field of wild animal welfare research | Michelle Graham and Oscar Horta Jan 12, 2021

Show notes

Michelle and Oscar discuss the wide variety of research areas relevant to wild animal welfare, the career and educational pathways to conducting such research, and how you can support the movement along the way.

Michelle Graham is the Executive Director of Wild Animal Initiative. Her projects have included work on prioritizing and categorizing different interventions. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Engineering Mechanics at Virginia Tech; her dissertation concerns the movement behaviors of jumping and gliding snakes. Michelle previously studied physics and philosophy at the University of Oxford, and has worked with animals in shelter, veterinary, farm, and zoo environments.

Oscar Horta has been involved in animal advocacy since the mid-’90s, and is a founding member of Animal Ethics. He is also a professor of philosophy at the University of Santiago de Compostela, and previously worked as a researcher at the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology. He works mainly on speciesism and wild animal suffering.

This talk was taken from EA Student Summit 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentations.

Mitigating catastrophic biorisks | Kevin Esvelt Jan 08, 2021

Show notes

In a world now painfully aware of pandemics, with ever-increasing access to autonomous biological agents, how can we help channel society’s response to COVID-19 to minimize the risk of deliberate misuse? Using the challenge of securing DNA synthesis as an example, Kevin outlines the key norms and incentives governing biotechnology, lays out potential strategies for reform, and suggests ways in which thoughtful individuals might help safely and credibly discuss and mitigate biorisks without spreading information hazards.

Kevin Michael Esvelt is an American biologist. He is currently an assistant professor at the MIT Media Lab and leads the Sculpting Evolution group. After receiving a B.A. in chemistry and biology from Harvey Mudd College, he completed his PhD work at Harvard University as a Hertz Fellow. Esvelt developed phage assisted continuous evolution (PACE) during his PhD as a graduate student in David R. Liu’s laboratory. As a Wyss Technology Fellow, Esvelt was involved with the development of gene drive technology. He focuses on the bioethics and biosafety of gene drives. In 2016, Esvelt was named an Innovator Under 35 by MIT Technology Review.

This talk was taken from EA Global Asia and Pacific 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

Cellular agriculture: futureproofing our food systems for humans, animals and our planet | Bianca Le Jan 05, 2021

Show notes

Bianca Le is the founder and director of Cellular Agriculture Australia. CAA is a nonprofit organization with the mission of improving human health and building resilient food systems in Australia. They do this by promoting and accelerating the development of healthy and sustainable animal proteins through research and development in cellular agriculture.

Cellular agriculture is an emerging research field dedicated to developing food for our growing population without sacrificing our planet. Modern biomedical technology can be applied to food science to farm meat, eggs and dairy directly from cells, not animals. Cellular agriculture has the potential to reduce the impact of food production on our environment, health, and animal welfare. As a nascent industry, the foundations of the ecosystem laid today will determine the potential impact of the field on our world.

This talk was taken from EA Global Asia and Pacific 2020. Click here to watch the talk with the PowerPoint presentation.

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