I want to open up the debate again whether to split donations or to concentrate them in one place.

One camp insists on donating all your money to a single charity with the highest current marginal effectiveness. The other camp claims that you should split donations for various reasons ranging from concerns like "if everyone thought like this" to "don't put all your eggs in one basket." My position is firmly in the second camp as it seems to me obvious that you should split your donations just as you split your investments, because of risk.

But it is not obvious at all. If a utility function is concave risk aversion arises completely naturally and with it all the associated theory of how to avoid unnecessary risk. Utilitarians however seem to consider it natural that the moral utility function is completely linear in the number of people or QALYs or any other measure of human well-being. Is there any theoretical reason risk-aversion can arise if a utility function is completely linear in the way described before?

In the same vein, there seems to be no theoretical reason for having time preference in a certain world. So if we agree that we should invest our donations and donate them later it seems like there is no reason to actually donate them at any time since at any such time we could follow the same reasoning and push the donation even further. Is the conlcusion then to either donate now or not at all? Or should the answer be way more complicated involving average and local economic growth and thus the impact of money donated now or later?

Let the perfect not be the enemy of the good, but this rabbit hole seems to go deeper and deeper.

Survey completed, besides the digit ratio.

My temporary solution is to max out my employer's annual match. That the maximum match is somewhere between 10 and 15 percent of my income is very convenient, as that makes me feel like I'm contributing the "expected" amount for an EA (this feeling is only important for fuzzies) but still leaves me with what seems to be a good amount to save and spend. It also allows me to avoid committing an answer to the question of whether to donate now or invest and donate later. The guaranteed, almost-immediate, soon-to-expire 100% return provided by the match wins pretty clearly over the EV of investing and donating later, and since I feel like I'm donating enough for now, I can evaluate what to do with what's being invested later on, based on my wants and needs.

We might be mutually holding the others point equal. Sure one can get more money working, but I meant aside from that. Did you mean aside from the best alternative use of 40 hours per week?

Thanks for reply! My question was unclear, but I meant the other meaning. I strongly do believe in doing whatever one does well, but not in seeking to do more work in the first place. I mean the idea that there's something more noble about working 40+ hours a week than not, and that people with sufficient means shouldn't retire in their thirties.

Sure, one can build habits at work, but one can do so cheaper than 2000 hours of one's life per year, net of compensation. Admittedly this does not apply so much if you love your job, but hypothetically if someone values leisure more, is there a way in which choosing that leisure is less ethical?

Or is the correct model something like: abuse can change things to worse, but any non-abusive parenting simply means the child will grow up determined by their genes? That is, we have a biologically set "destiny", and all the environment can do is either help us reach this destiny or somehow cripple us halfway (by abuse, by lack of nutrition, etc.).

In an home environment within the normal range for a population, the home environment will matter little in a predictable sense on many traits compared to the genetic legacy, and random events/choices/biological-events/accidents/etc. There are some traits it will matter a lot on, and in a causal sense, the home environment may determine various important outcomes but not in a way that is predictable or easily measured. The other category of 'nonshared environment' is often bigger than the genetic legacy, so speaking of a biologically set destiny is misleading: biologically influenced would be a better phrase.

This chapter confirms earlier speculations that horcruxes work by making backup copies of brain states (with the caveat that actually using the horcrux will merge its memories and personality with those of its host body, resulting in a hybrid entity). The theory that Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres is an instance of Tom Riddle (or, rather, a hybrid of Tom Riddle and the original Harry Potter) now seems very, very probable. It explains why Harry is as smart as Tom's other instances (the original Riddle/Monroe/Voldemort and the Quirrell/Riddle hybrid), and why the remember-ball glowed like the sun (Harry forgot Riddle's memories because he was too young to remember them).

I learned of the horcrux sspell ssince long ago.

Parseltongue has a word for "horcrux"?

Death iss not truly gainssaid. Real sself is losst, as you ssay. Not to my pressent tasste. Admit I conssidered it, long ago.

Voldemort used horcruxes, obviously (that's what the five hidden items in the elemental pattern are), but between the missing memories and the hybridization Quirrellmort doesn't consider them to be worth the trouble. Keep in mind that there is a nice theory about not being able to lie in parseltongue.

Not like certain people living in certain countries, who were, it was said, as human as anyone else; who were said to be sapient beings, worth more than any mere unicorn. But who nonetheless wouldn't be allowed to live in Muggle Britain. On that score, at least, no Muggle had the right to look a wizard in the eye. Magical Britain might discriminate against Muggleborns, but at least it allowed them inside so they could be spat upon in person.

I suppose open borders and unrestricted immigration are in-keeping with Harry's character as a utilitarian who tries to assign equal value to each and every human life.

Also, won't Quirrell die of transfiguration sickness if he drinks the blood of transfigured Rarity?

Effective animal altruism question: I may be getting a dog. Dogs are omnivores who seem to need meat to stay healthy. What's the most ethical way to keep my hypothetical dog happy and healthy?

Edit: Answers Pet Foods appears to satisfice. I'll be going with this pending evidence that there's a better solution.

Is it always correct to choose that action with the highest expected utility?

Suppose I have a choice between action A, which grants -100 utilons with 99.9% chance and +1000000 utilons with 0.1% chance, or action B which grants +1 utilon with 100% chance. A has an expected utility of +900.1 utilons, while B has an expected utility of +1 utilon. This decision will be available to me only once, and all future decision will involve utility changes on the order of a few utilons.

Intuitively, it seems like action A is too risky. I'll almost certainly end up with a huge decrease in utility, just because there's a remote chance of a windfall. Risk aversion doesn't apply here, since we're dealing in utility, right? So either I'm failing to truly appreciate the chance at getting 1M utilons -- I'm stuck thinking about it as I would money -- or this is a case where there's reason to not take the action that maximizes expected value. Help?

EDIT: Changed the details of action A to what was intended

If I am reading the less wrong comment formatting page correctly, using poll:probability (with brackets) will force responses to be between 0 and 1, to avoid this. (And Upvotes to whoever put strict input limits on a free text field! As a person who handles raw data, I often don't see this, and it should be encouraged when performed.)