The Most Good You Can Do

How Effective Altruism Is Changing Ideas About Living Ethically

Peter Singer

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780300180275
• eBook ISBN: 9780300182415
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Nonprofit Organizations & Charities

An argument for putting sentiment aside and maximizing the practical impact of our donated dollars: "Powerful, provocative" (Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times).
 
Peter Singer's books and ideas have been disturbing our complacency ever since the appearance of Animal Liberation. Now he directs our attention to a challenging new movement in which his own ideas have played a crucial role: effective altruism. Effective altruism is built upon the simple but profoundly unsettling idea that living a fully ethical life involves doing the "most good you can do."
 
Such a life requires a rigorously unsentimental view of charitable giving: to be a worthy recipient of our support, an organization must be able to demonstrate that it will do more good with our money or our time than other options open to us. Singer introduces us to an array of remarkable people who are restructuring their lives in accordance with these ideas, and shows how, paradoxically, living altruistically often leads to greater personal fulfillment than living for oneself.
 
Doing the Most Good develops the challenges Singer has made, in the New York Times and Washington Post, to those who donate to the arts, and to charities focused on helping our fellow citizens, rather than those for whom we can do the most good. Effective altruists are extending our knowledge of the possibilities of living less selfishly, and of allowing reason, rather than emotion, to determine how we live. Doing the Most Good offers new hope for our ability to tackle the world's most pressing problems.

Index

Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), (i), (ii)

abstract reasoning, (i), (ii), (iii)

Access Long Distance, (i)

advocacy. See political advocacy

affluent vs. poor countries, (i), (ii), (iii)

Against Malaria Foundation, (i), (ii)

AI (artificial intelligence), (i), (ii)

Aknin, Lara, (i)

altruism, effective. See effective altruism

altruistic arbitrage, (i)

Ambrose, archbishop of Milan, (i)

Angola, corruption in, (i)

Animal Activists’ Handbook, The (Ball and Friedrich), (i)

Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE), (i), (ii), (iii), (iv)

Animal Liberation (Singer), (i)

“Animal Liberation” (Singer), (i), (ii)

animal rights, (i), (ii)

animal suffering: emotion and reason in response to, (i); pets vs. farm animals, (i), (ii), (iii); product testing and, (i); and reducing consumption of animal products, (i), (ii), (iii), (iv), (v)n12; Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors and, (i); speciesism, (i), (ii)

arbitrage, altruistic, (i)

art and art museums, (i), (ii)

Arthur, John, (i)

artificial intelligence (AI), (i), (ii)

asteroids, (i), (ii)

Authors for Peace, (i)

Avon, (i)

Ball, Matt, (i)

Banerjee, Abhijit, (i)

Basil, Priya, (i)

Batkid, (i)

bednets for malaria, (i), (ii), (iii)

“Behind the Brands” campaign, (i)

Berger, Alexander, (i)

Berman, Melissa, (i), (ii), (iii), (iv), (v), (vi), (vii), (viii), (ix)

Berreby-Greenbaum, Lucie, (i)

Bhattacharya, Aveek, (i), (ii)

Big 10 food brands, (i)

Bintliff, Elizabeth, (i)

bioterrorism, (i)

birth control, (i), (ii)

blindne...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• One
• Two
• Three
• Four
• Afterword
• Notes
• Index
• About the Author