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🌍 What Is Effective Altruism?

Effective Altruism (EA) is a philosophy and social movement that uses evidence and reason to determine the most effective ways to improve the world — and then takes action based on that understanding. Instead of simply asking, "How can I help?" it asks, "How can I help the most?"

At its core, EA is about maximizing impact: doing the most good you can with the time, money, and energy you have.

🌱 Origins of Effective Altruism

Effective Altruism emerged in the late 2000s and early 2010s from a convergence of philosophy, economics, and nonprofit evaluation. Key figures include:

• Peter Singer, a moral philosopher who argued in his famous essay "Famine, Affluence, and Morality" (1972) that we are morally obligated to help others if we can do so without sacrificing something of comparable moral importance.
• Toby Ord and Will MacAskill, Oxford philosophers who formalized the EA movement and co-founded organizations like Giving What We Can and The Centre for Effective Altruism.
• Organizations like GiveWell and 80,000 Hours, which helped ground EA in rigorous research and practical tools.

🧠 The Core Ideas of EA

1. Impartiality

   All lives have equal moral worth, regardless of where someone lives or what background they come from. Saving a life in your hometown and saving a life across the world should be valued equally.

2. Cause Prioritization

   Not all problems are equally solvable. EA seeks to identify which global problems are most:

   • Important (how large is the problem?)
   • Neglected (how much attention/resources is it already getting?)
   • Tractable (how solvable is it?)

3. Evidence-Based Giving

   EA encourages people to support charities and interventions that have measurable and proven impact. It uses randomized controlled trials, cost-effectiveness analysis, and long-term tracking to decide where money or time will do the most good.

4. Personal Responsibility + Career Impact

   Your career, not just your donations, can be a massive lever for impact. EA asks: What career will let me do the most good with the skills I have?

5. Room for Funding

   An organization is not just good because it’s doing important work. EA evaluates whether it still needs additional money to scale. A brilliant charity that’s already fully funded may not need more donations as urgently as one that is both effective and underfunded.