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PODCAST

EA Forum Podcast (All audio)

Audio narrations from the Effective Altruism Forum, including curated posts, posts with 30 karma, and other great writing. If you"d like fewer episodes, subscribe to the "EA Forum (Curated & Popular)" podcast instead.

technology philosophy

All Episodes

4:35

“Welfare tech should be developed by welfare people”...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/30

This is a lightly-edited memo I wrote for the 2025 Animal Advocacy Strategy Forum, which were encouraged to be highly opinionated to generate strategy discussion. It seems strange to me that animal advocates rely on animal ag to come up with the solutions that we want to see. We identify a problem, we look to see what exists in the world, we try to find the best of those things, and then we try to get them implemented. I would like to see welfare-oriented engineers actively develop the tech that we

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24:30

“Should EAs pay more attention to Climate Tipping...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/28

Climate change doesn't rank as a top EA cause area because it already receives substantial funding, is less neglected than other risks, and—under gradual-warming scenarios—seems unlikely to cause human extinction. I broadly agree with that assessment. Yet some problems under the climate umbrella do fit EA criteria of scale, neglectedness, and tractability. Climate tipping points in particular could trigger catastrophic feedback loops—mass human suffering, great-power conflict, biodiversity

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28:41

“Morality Isn’t Objective” by Noah Birnbaum

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/27

In response to Matthew's post about the objectivity of morality, I'd thought I'd throw out a(n initially -- this became much longer than I was expecting) short post explaining why I think this view is pretty implausible. I have another post on my Substack that shows why I think some other arguments for moral realism fail (though I'm not sure I endorse everything I argue there anymore...). If you like this one, check it out! Note: The formatting of this article got a little messed up (inconsistent

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20:39

[Linkpost] “Reducing suffering given long-term...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/27

This is a link post. An objection against trying to reduce suffering is that we cannot predict whether our actions will reduce or increase suffering in the long term. Relatedly, some have argued that we are clueless about the effects that any realistic action would have on total welfare, and this cluelessness, it has been claimed, undermines our reason to help others in effective ways. For example, DiGiovanni (2025) writes: “if my arguments [about cluelessness] hold up, our reason to work on EA

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31:56

[Linkpost] “The Industrial Explosion” by rosehadshar

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/27

This is a link post. Summary To quickly transform the world, it's not enough for AI to become super smart (the "intelligence explosion"). AI will also have to turbocharge the physical world (the "industrial explosion"). Think robot factories building more and better robot factories, which build more and better robot factories, and so on. The dynamics of the industrial explosion has gotten remarkably little attention. This post lays out how the industrial explosion could play out, and how quickly

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32:15

[Linkpost] “The Industrial Explosion” by rosehadshar,...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/27

This is a link post. Summary To quickly transform the world, it's not enough for AI to become super smart (the "intelligence explosion"). AI will also have to turbocharge the physical world (the "industrial explosion"). Think robot factories building more and better robot factories, which build more and better robot factories, and so on. The dynamics of the industrial explosion has gotten remarkably little attention. This post lays out how the industrial explosion could play out, and how quickly

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11:59

“Anchoring AI and Animals” by Kevin Xia 🔸

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/27

Many thanks to Max Taylor, Alistair Stewart, Albert Didriksen, Jeff and Johannes Pichler for feedback on this post. All mistakes are my own. This post does not necessarily reflect the views of my employer.Executive Summary I believe that AI development could have an outsized impact on animal welfare and that these stakes warrant deep investigation. However, the complexity and uncertainty involved make it difficult to approach this. This post outlines three robust anchor points— concepts that we

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1:16

[Linkpost] “Is it even possible to convince people to...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/27

This is a link post. Kenny Torrella at Vox has written a nice piece on demand-side interventions to reduce meat consumption, and what we might lose if we focus entirely on producers and politics (supply-side interventions). The article focuses on the results of a very nice preprint about the effects of watching Dominion (Kramer and Landry 2025) and also covers a meta-analysis I worked on, and previously summarized on the forum. I am quoted in the article, and I very much believe this: “I think

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12:27

“The Practical Value of Flawed Models: A Response to...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/26

Crossposted from my Substack. @titotal recently posted an in-depth critique of AI 2027. I'm a fan of his work, and this post was, as expected, phenomenal*. Much of the critique targets the unjustified weirdness of the superexponential time horizon growth curve that underpins the AI 2027 forecast. During my own quick excursion into the Timelines simulation code, I set the probability of superexponential growth to ~0 because, yeah, it seemed pretty sus. But I didn’t catch (or write about) the full

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14:32

[Linkpost] “Why we ignore the suffering of wild...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/26

This is a link post. A hidden crisis Literally, quintillions1 of animals are suffering and dying right now in the wild, due to disease, hunger, thirst, excessive heat or cold, and other factors. Yet, most people—including those who express concern for animals—fail to give importance to this issue. Why? In this article, we explore the cognitive biases2 that lead us to ignore one of the world's largest sources of suffering and death.3 Understanding these biases can help us think more clearly about our

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45:10

“Summary of John Halstead’s Book-Length Report on...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/25

1 Introduction (Crossposted from my blog--formatting is better there). Very large numbers of people seem to think that climate change is likely to end the world. Biden and Harris both called it an existential threat. AOC warned a few years ago that “the world is going to end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change.” Thunberg once approvingly cited a supposed “top climate scientist” making the claim that “climate change will wipe out humanity unless we stop using fossil fuels over the next

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25:52

“A History of Global Development” by DavidNash

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/25

Summary I've recently completed a 7 week series on global development, I thought it would be useful to share each week on the forum as well in case people missed the announcement post. The aim is to give people a more comprehensive overview of the global development landscape, either for those considering working/donating in this area, or if you are already in development but want to consider switching focus. It seemed to me that resources in development & EA spaces were narrowly focused, with

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12:09

“The Need to Optimize EA Content to Show Up in AI...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/25

As more people turn to AI assistants like ChatGPT and Perplexity to answer their questions, an opportunity to go beyond traditional communication efforts like SEO arises. Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) refers to the practice of structuring content so it can be accurately retrieved and cited by large language models (LLMs). For EA-aligned organizations, AEO could be more than a communications tactic, as it could be an opportunity to strengthen program impact, improve fundraising efficiency, and

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47:37

“Systems Change 101” by Swan 🔸, Lin BL, Karen...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/24

In alphabetical order: Ben Smith, @Karen Singleton, @Lin BL, Rebecca Zanini,, @Swan 🔸 , @Ulf Graf 🔹 Acknowledgements: Rosanna Zimdahl, Ruben Dieleman, Samuel Hilton and Simon Holm. Preface/TL;DR We believe systems thinking offers valuable tools for identifying more impactful interventions. This post aims to help you: Understand systems thinking and systems change and advocate for their value to EA. Apply systems thinking to your cause area to identify more impactful interventions. Find

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19:46

“Morality is Objective” by Bentham’s Bulldog

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/24

Is Morality ObjectivePlace your vote or view results.disagreeagree There is dispute among EAs--and the general public more broadly--about whether morality is objective. So I thought I'd kick off a [...] ---First published: June 24th, 2025 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/n5bePqoC46pGZJzqL/morality-is-objective --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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4:20

“Vegan Challenges Are An Underrated Lever For Diet...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/24

As part of conducting research into my Tactics in Practice series (reports designed to understand the impact and potential improvements to common interventions to improve animal welfare), I am often a bit let down by what the research says. After reviewing the evidence behind vegan and meat-reduction challenges and pledges, I have to say I am more optimistic about this tactic than I was before investigating it. I believe they have the potential to shift collective diet change more than most people

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7:52

“The Lies of Big Bug” by Bentham’s Bulldog

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/23

Crosspost of this blog article. The majority of farmed animals killed each year are insects, and this number is only expected to increase. By 2033, it's estimated that around 5 trillion insects will be slaughtered annually—more than 50 times the number of cows, pigs, chickens, turkeys, and the like currently slaughtered. But insect farming is built on a dark secret: its foundational premises are all lies! There has been a calculated plot by the insect farming industry to mislead the public. They

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4:52

“Arkose is Closing” by Arkose

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/23

Summary Arkose is an early-stage AI safety fieldbuilding nonprofit focused on accelerating the involvement of experienced machine learning professionals in technical AI safety research through direct outreach, one-on-one calls, and public resources. Between December 2023 and June 2025, we had one-on-one calls with 311 such professionals. 78% of those professionals said their initial call accelerated their involvement in AI safety[1]. Unfortunately, we’re closing due to a lack of funding. We remain

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10:25

“Should we launch the ‘Animal Advocacy Corps’?...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/23

Summary This post considers the idea of an Animal Advocacy Corps, which would be modeled after the US Peace Corps program and involve recent graduates spending a year working in-person at various pro-animal organizations/companies. The main goal of this project, were it to happen, would be to a) increase the number of young people engaged in animal advocacy in some capacity, and b) increase the level of in-person organization in the movement*. How you can help: I’m not going to start this idea

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23:53

“Should more EAs become technical sales...

EA Forum Podcast (All audio) ·

2025/06/22

Sales is rarely discussed as a career path in EA. This post explores whether technical sales roles — especially B2B Sales Engineering — might be a fast, high-leverage path for building career capital. It compares sales to other roles, and makes the case that sales deserves more serious attention from EA students and professionals. Depth: Medium. I am just a college student but I believe this could provide significant value. (I completed a sales bootcamp a month ago, and spent good time reflecting

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2,063 results

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