Effective Altruism News
Effective Altruism News
- Lost Landscapes 02025
- Misaligned AIs might engage in research sabotage: making safety research go poorly by doing things like withholding their best ideas or putting subtle bugs in experiments. To mitigate this risk with AI control, we need very different techniques than those in the original control paper or Ctrl-Z, because research sabotage differs from those settings in two crucial ways:
- EA Forum Digest # 238 Hello!. Conferences! The application deadline EAGxPrague is approaching, Friday May 2nd is the last day to apply. And two newly announced: EAGxNigeria (July 11-13) and EAGxAmsterdam (December 12-14). — JP (for the Forum team) We recommend: Polls Debate: should EA avoid using AI art outside of research? (titotal, 4 min).
- Caleb is Project Lead of EA Funds. Zach is CEO of the Centre for Effective Altruism, and Oscar is CEA’s Chief of Staff. EA Funds and CEA are currently separate projects within Effective Ventures. EV is winding down, and so EA Funds and CEA will spin out. We have decided to spin out as one organization rather than two, and that organization will be called CEA.
- This is the video and transcript of a talk I gave at Anthropic in April 2025 on automating alignment research. You can also view the slides here. The content from this talk is from a longer essay on the topic, available here, and in audio form (read by the author) here. . Okay. Hi everybody. Thanks for coming. So: how do we solve alignment? It's a big question.
- (This is the fifth essay in a series that I’m calling “How do we solve the alignment problem?”. I’m hoping that the individual essays can be read fairly well on their own, but see this introduction for a summary of the essays that have been released thus far, and for a bit more about the series as a whole. Podcast version (read by the author) here, or search for "Joe Carlsmith Audio" on your...
- [EDIT: initial publication did not have the link to the original post, and was missing the footnotes. Sorry about that! Fixed now.]. [This has been lightly edited from the original post, eliminating some introductory material that LW readers won't need. Thanks to Stefan Schubert for suggesting I repost here.
- Hi everyone,. I am a lecturer in philosophy at the University of Reading and currently trying to set-up at a lab focused on animal and AI sentience and welfare. Since many EAs are doing research in this area, I thought it might be useful to make an announcement here. Lab description:
- Here are Kenny's papers https://philpeople.org/profiles/kenneth-l-pearce Here's my blog https://benthams.substack.com/
- 📮EA Switzerland - April Updates Apply for EA Global London!🚀 View this email in your browser Summary: Hey <<First Name>>, Welcome to this month's update! The key points in brief: 💸Effektiv Spenden is Hiring a Country Manager for Switzerland💸.
- Against both wokeism and anti-wokeism
- Black and white thinking sucks
- New Online Course: Build Positive AI Futures
- How to upzone Hong Kong
- This Faunalytics study identifies best practices for engaging with political staffers to strengthen legislative advocacy efforts to advance animal protection. The post Effective Communication With Political Staffers: A Framework For Animal Advocates appeared first on Faunalytics.
- If the UK adopted similar policies, I would be deported
- he confessed to it in his book!
- Lessons from a year of TRT
- Limited access to veterinary care has created an animal welfare crisis affecting millions of companion animals. What do veterinarians think about virtual care as a means of improving access?. The post Virtual Veterinary Care: Exploring The Divide Between Supporters And Skeptics appeared first on Faunalytics.
- Five selected artists will create a collective body of works centered on the lived experiences of African women and girls affected by NTDs. The post The END Fund and African Women in Photography Announce Commissions for Lens-Based Works Exploring the Impact of NTDs on Women and Girls in Africa appeared first on The END Fund.
- Discuss...
- Introduction. In this post, I present what I believe to be an important yet underexplored argument that fundamentally challenges the promise of cultivated meat. In essence, there are compelling reasons to conclude that cultivated meat will not replace conventional meat, but will instead primarily compete with other alternative proteins that offer superior environmental and ethical benefits.
- Imagine a society that regularly practices torture. What kind of person becomes a professional torturer? Let's just say that lots of people who were qualified for torturing will decide that's not how they want to spend their Saturdays, and go do something else instead. The profession.
- Every choice we make leaves something behind. A shift in thinking, a conversation, a ripple we don’t notice. This month, I want to share the kind of impact that doesn’t usually make it to the headlines. The kind that starts quietly, asking a decision-maker a difficult question, starting a dialogue about speciesism in a classroom, […].
- Significant progress is still needed to tackle longstanding inequalities and wage gaps for people with disabilities. Here's how Sightsavers is taking action.
- Here are the summaries and slides of the four lectures I will give at the University of Geneva (May 3rd). The philosophy of animal rights Starting point: no-one is allowed to make any choice that involves avoidable unwanted arbitrariness. Arbitrariness … Lees verder →...
- From a talk at Anthropic in April 2025.
- It’s really important; we have a real shot; there are a lot of ways we can fail.
- It's really important; we've got a real shot; there are a ton of ways to fail. Text version here: https://joecarlsmith.com/2025/04/30/can-we-safely-automate-alignment-research/. There's also a video and transcript of a talk I gave on this topic here: https://joecarlsmith.com/2025/04/30/video-and-transcript-of-talk-on-automating-alignment-research/...
- At the Happier Lives Institute, we think that providing free psychotherapy for people with common mental health challenges living in low-income countries is a good idea. In fact, we think it’s one of the most cost-effective ways to increase wellbeing globally.
- The post From Misinformation to Mobilization: How Digital Tools Are Boosting Immunization in Uganda appeared first on Living Goods.
- At THL, we're dedicated to providing an exceptional employee experience, supporting our team, removing barriers, and equipping our people with the skills, knowledge, and tools needed to achieve THL’s mission and goals. We're seeking someone who shares our vision and commitment to a culture of excellence.
- My upvotes/downvotes are worth 2 points each and my supervotes are worth 6. A person with between 10 and 100 karma on the forum has an upvote worth 1 and a supervote worth 2 (the scaling system is described in this code here I think).
- Carney carnage and rising tensions in Kashmir
- The Guardian reported yesterday on 'The Lunar Hatch' project, which is aiming to send fertilised sea bass eggs into space, so they can farm fish for astronauts. Lunar Hatch’s ultimate aim is to create a “closed-loop food chain” on the moon, using a series of compartments. The first tanks will be filled with water from ice found at the bottom of craters at the moon’s poles.
- Inertia and why we need it
- “The world is going to get a lot funnier, weirder, and quirkier.”...
- Analyzing public recommendations to the Office of Science and Technology Policy’s (OSTP) AI Action Plan
- Analyzing public recommendations to the Office of Science and Technology Policy’s (OSTP) AI Action Plan
- Even if their proponents were right about their effects, they'd be obviously immoral
- Researchers test assumptions about what captive wild animals truly need to maintain well-being and highlight deficiencies in modern zoo practices. The post Time Well Spent? Using Wild Behavior To Evaluate Captive Animal Welfare appeared first on Faunalytics.
- The IP28 campaign in Oregon—seeking to place a ban on slaughter, hunting, fishing, experimentations, and forced breeding on the 2026 statewide ballot—passed our 50,000 signatures collected milestone! We also ended the month of April collecting over 5,000 signatures thanks to some of the new petitioners we onboarded earlier this Spring.
- Hi Fast,. We are pleased to share that Fundación Derecho y Defensa Animal has secured three new cage-free commitments, with the support of the Open Wing Alliance. These include La Subida, a restaurant located at the foot of Cerro San Cristóbal, a site of great historical significance; Rincón de Las Brujas, a restaurant serving in Pomaire, one of the most popular rural tourist destinations...
- In five years, we could have AI systems capable of accelerating science and automating skilled jobs.
- In five years, we could have AI systems capable of transforming science and automating skilled jobs.
- The merits of unified land ownership
- Also AI export controls, horses, and organ music
- In this post, we list 7 of our favorite easy-to-start directions in AI control. (Really, projects that are at least adjacent to AI control; We include directions which aren’t as centrally AI control and which also have other motivations.).
- The Global Flourishing Study (GFS) is a landmark longitudinal study led by Harvard University’s Human Flourishing Program and Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion, in collaboration with Gallup and COS. The study has collected comprehensive data from approximately 200,000 participants across 22 culturally and geographically diverse regions.
- The Global Flourishing Study (GFS) is a landmark longitudinal study led by Harvard University’s Human Flourishing Program and Baylor University’s Institute for Studies of Religion, in collaboration with Gallup and COS. The study has collected comprehensive data from approximately 200,000 participants across 22 culturally and geographically diverse regions.
- In this episode of our podcast, Timothy Telleen-Lawton and I talk to Oliver Habryka of Lightcone Infrastructure about his thoughts on the Open Philanthropy Project, which he believes has become stifled by the PR demands of its primary funder, Good Ventures.
- TLDR: RP's best interventions barely qualify as Health Systems Strengthening - they focus directly on the Health worker and their implementation. Not only these, but almost all HSS interventions are measureable and should be measured! Plus some light disagreements with RP.
- I recently discovered the concept of ‘limbic language’.
- The argument was flawless.
- Hello FAST members I hope these lines find you very well. We wanted to tell you about the progress of the egg labeling bill in Peru. It's a very important moment, with daily updates from the Congress of the Republic. In November 2023, with the support of Fundación Veg (Chile), we succeeded in getting Congresswoman Sigrid Bazán to submit Bill No.
- And trans men are men
- An examination of children’s films uncovers the subtle ways they normalize consumption of animal-based foods. The post The Role Of Media In Normalizing Animal-Based Diets appeared first on Faunalytics.
- After a terrorist attack in Kashmir left 26 dead, relations between India and Pakistan sharply deteriorated, culminating in the exchange of fire across the border between the two countries
- In 2024, Mercy For Animals turned 25! Since our inception, we’ve worked hard to protect farmed animals and build a better world for all. Through the years, we’ve helped secure policies that will ease suffering for more than eight billion animals. We’ve also helped schools serve more than 35 million vegan meals and encouraged many […].
- Silk is stronger than steel or kevlar. What could it be used for?
- I'm writing this on behalf of the mod team. They've reviewed and commented on this post, but mistakes are mine. We want and value criticism on the EA Forum. EA organisations often make their decisions transparent to the Forum audience in a way which makes good criticism possible.
- At the request of @Vasco Grilo🔸 in a post that I can't get out of drafts, here's the full linkpost. Original post is below: So this post is an argument that multi-decade timelines are reasonable, and the key cruxes that Ege Erdil has with most AI safety people who believe in short timelines are due to the following set of beliefs:
- Are you a bystander or an actor?
- Greetings from a world where…...
- I wanted to share a small but important challenge I've encountered as a student engaging with Effective Altruism from a lower-income country (Nigeria), and invite thoughts or suggestions from the community. Recently, I tried to make a one-time donation to one of the EA-aligned charities listed on the Giving What We Can platform.
- Chefs wear a chef's hat. Soldiers wear a beret. BUT WHY?. Please note: this is a topic I have ~0 preexisting knowledge about; I found one reasonable source for each hat then stopped, so ~any information listed here may be wrong. Chef's Hat. The excellent Daniel.
- ⬇️⬇️⬇️ L'épisode entier ⬇️⬇️⬇️ https://youtu.be/dN2mxByDlwU
- A story of how our work helps journalists who use data.
- Dear Friends,. April 24th, 2025 marked World Day for Laboratory Animals—a day to remember the millions of animals used in scientific research, often overlooked in the broader animal advocacy movement, as they are not considered Farmed Animals. At Te Protejo, we launched #MoreThanANumber in Chile and Mexico, a campaign to bring visibility and compassion to the lives of rats and mice—the most...
- Hi everyone! The education department at Switch4Good is hiring someone to work on our Campus Action Now program on a part-time, contractor basis. This document has all the details. Applications close May 9. Please feel free to contact me (lucyw@switch4good.org) with any questions, and also to share with anyone you think might be a good fit. Thanks! . Discuss...
- The Veterinary Association for Farm Animal Welfare (VAFAW) is hosting a webinar that may interest you and your colleagues. The webinar, Essential Elements for Successful Group Housing of Sows, will be held on Thursday, May 8, 2025 by renowed animal welfare scientist, Dr. Jeremy Marchant.
- Building a high-speed rail between Los Angeles and San Francisco was never going to be easy — but the critics who write it off are missing the real source of the project’s struggles.
- This is post 2 of a sequence on my framework for doing and thinking about research. Start here. Before I get into what exactly to do at each stage of the research process, it’s worth reflecting on the key mindsets that are crucial throughout the process, and how they should manifest at each stage. I think the most important mindsets are:
- We're asking the hard questions: how much does it cost to save a life? 🤔 Discover more about this in the full video: https://youtu.be/ekIRVhbpiQw
- this week in security — april 27 edition Signalgate 2.0, Easterly warns politicizing cyber is 'dangerously degrading', Microsoft Recall returns, and more. ~this week in security~. a cybersecurity newsletter by @zackwhittaker volume 8, issue 17 View this email in your browser | past issues | RSS ~ ~ THIS WEEK, TL;DR. Hegseth had unsecured internet line in...
- Against rewilding
- The idea that we can substitute carbon-based neurons with functionally equivalent artificial neurons (made of, say, silicon) is at the heart of many discussions about consciousness. For me, this used to be a load-bearing argument for caring about digital consciousness, and I think it still is for many people, including at Anthropic.
- Three things I missed in pre-training
- Exploring the private sector's role in development: from job creation and innovation to potential harms and the challenge of measuring true impact beyond what markets would deliver anyway. Can businesses be a force for good?
- In this Gradient Updates weekly issue, Ege discusses the case for multi-decade AI timelines.
- Discuss...
- This is the first post in a sequence about how I think about and break down my research process. Post 2 is coming soon. Thanks to Oli Clive-Griffin, Paul Bogdan, Shivam Raval and especially to Jemima Jones for help and feedback, and to my co-author Gemini 2.5 Pro - putting 200K tokens of past blog posts and a long voice memo in the context window is OP. Introduction.
- Hear me out, I think the most forbidden technique is very useful and should be used, as long as we avoid the "most forbidden aftertreatment:". An AI trained on interpretability techniques must not be trained on capabilities after (or during) it is trained on interpretability techniques, otherwise it will relearn bad behaviour—in a more sneaky way. An AI trained on interpretability techniques...
- Why did I create both a post and a wiki article?. Posts are best for making sure people see the initial version of the post, whilst Wiki articles are best for long-term maintenance. Posting an article that links to a Wiki page provides the best of both worlds. For the most up-to-date version, see the Wiki page. Articles: There should be more AI safety organisations.
- This is a personal post and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of other members of Apollo Research. I think I could have written a better version of this post with more time. However, my main hope for this post is that people with more expertise use this post as a prompt to write better, more narrow versions for the respective concrete suggestions.
- But the problem with alternative media is deeper than just her
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