William MacAskill
Special guest
William MacAskill is an associate professor of philosophy at Oxford University, where he serves as Co-Principal Investigator of the Programme on the Philosophical Foundations of Effective Altruism. He's also the founder and president of 80,000 Hours, the co-founder and vice-president of Giving What We Can, and the author of Doing Good Better.
William MacAskill has been a guest on 1 episode.
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Episode 147: Effective Altruism and Moral Uncertainty (with The One True Scotsman, Will MacAskill)
September 4th, 2018 | 1 hr 43 mins
Oxford philosophy professor Will MacAskill joins us to talk about effective altruism, moral uncertainty, and why you shouldn’t eat your grandmother (even if consequentialism is true). How should we act when we’re not sure which moral theory is the right one? Can we formulate a guide for behavior, modeled on decision theory, that maximizes expected moral value? How do we assign credences to ethical (as opposed to empirical) claims? Why has effective altruism become so popular, so fast, yet at the same time seem off-putting to many people? Plus, Tamler faces a dilemma when narrating his audiobook, and Dave is the Louis CK of his own backyard.