Open thread, Oct. 20 - Oct. 26, 2014

MrMind

If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

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If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.

Notes for future OT posters:

1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag.

2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one. (Immediately before; refresh the list-of-threads page before posting.)

3. Open Threads should be posted in Discussion, and not Main.

4. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday.

Finding out where to donate is exhausting.

There are a couple of organisations affiliated with LW or organsiations that are inspired by the memespace. A remotely exhaustive list would be CFAR, MIRI, FHI, GiveWell. Which ones did I forget? Further, there are more traditional, gigantic organisations like the various organs of the UN or the catholic church. Finally, there are organisations like Wikipedia or the Linux foundation. In this jungle how should I found out where to donate my personal marginal monetary unit?

I posit that I should not. In no possible way am I qualified to judge that but I know just enough economics to claim that a mild amount of diversification should be better on aggregate than any kind of monoculture. GiveWell does some of this work of evaluating charities, but if everyone was donating to GiveWell instead of some to other charities I am sure those other causes would suffer quite some. Or is GiveWell intended as the universal charity and I should just not worry about where my money exactly will go except for the eventual internet outrage?

The dream is a one-click solution: This is how much money I am willing to give, have an organisation take it and distribute optimally relative to some chosen measure. Is GiveWell this?

GiveWell does some of this work of evaluating charities, but if everyone was donating to GiveWell instead of some to other charities I am sure those other causes would suffer quite some.

Following the Kantian maxim isn't good in this case. In effective altruism there's a concept called "room for funding". If you would have 10 billion $ and seek a target, GiveWell wouldn't be able to use that money as effectively as it uses a marginal dollar at the moment.

At the present moment simply going with GiveWell is a good option if you don't want to sp... (read more)

8Evan_Gaensbauer12y

Disclosure: I made a $1000 unrestricted donation to Givewell in June 2014. Givewell's donation portal allows you to donate to any of their three currently top recommended charities, or to donate to Givewell directly. If donating to Givewell directly one of two things can happen. i) You make a donation which restricts Givewell to allotting that money to one of it's top recommended charities as it sees fit to have the financial needs of those organizations met. ii) You make an unrestricted donation, which allows Givewell to use your donation to support its own operating cost. Since Givewell apparently receives sufficient funding to do their typical work, your donation, i.e., the marginal dollar, effectively funds the Open Philanthropy Project, formerly Givewell Labs. This is Givewell's joint investigative research venture with Good Ventures, a foundation worth hundreds of millions of dollars; their research right now is into global catastrophic risks, policy reform, and improving scientific research. This is the ambitious research the rationality community looks forward toward, and was profiled as such by Holden Karnofsky at the 2014 Effective Altruism Summit.

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