Effective Altruism: don't be tempted by the guide dog

Those who follow the news are confronted almost daily with images of terrible
poverty, people living by necessity in unsafe areas and maimed animals. To me
around, I notice that a lot of young people would like to help make the lives of these people and
animals for the better. With a fancy word, these young people are altruistically minded: we would like to
doing something good for our world and the people on it, without us doing anything in return
expect.

Yet sometimes it can be difficult to turn your good intentions into good deeds. In the media
charities are increasingly portrayed as corrupt corporations that take your money from your
donation to take a nice flight holiday myself. Moreover, I myself often see through the trees
the forest anymore. After all, there are so many charities that seem to need my money. Do I see on
TV a Make A Wish spot? I donate! Tell me about a project to train
guide dogs? I'm quite capable of putting aside a little money. All terribly good deeds,
right?

The heart linked to the mind
The Netherlands Effective Altruism Foundation would criticise my way of donating. This
movement is concerned with how to do something good as effectively as possible. How
can I improve as many lives as possible with my money and time? The inspiration of effective
altruism is Peter Singer, bioethicist and author of the book The Most Good You Can Do (2015). He
states that if I really want to have a positive impact on the world, after seeing the Make A
Wish advertising should not be guided solely by my feelings. To make the biggest possible difference
make, I have to try to make the right choice with my mind. “The heart, of course, you have
felt. You felt empathy (...). But it is very important to also use the mind to
ensuring that what you do is effective and purposeful,” Singer said.

So it's nice that I want to give something to charity, but then I have to go rational
figure out how to use my money to help as many people as possible. And what turns out? To make a
guide dog and its owner to train, you spend around 35,000 euros. However, it costs about 35 euros
To enable a blind person in a developing country to see again if he or she has trachoma, a
inflammation that is relatively easy to cure. With the cost of one guide dog, you can
also show about a thousand people again. The choice seems quickly made to me.

Fortunately, we don't have to do all this arithmetic ourselves. With the rise of effective altruism
various bodies were set up to do the work for us. For example
staff at non-profit organisation Givewell conducted research into which
organisations “save or improve the most lives per dollar”. From this research, a list
came up with the most effective charities, which can be found at www.givewell.org.

Effective Altruism Netherlands
Of course, donating money is not the only way you can make a positive impact
have. Even with simple everyday choices, you can do something good for the world around you. The
Foundation for Effective Altruism Netherlands was established to spread knowledge on how we can not only
with our money, but also with our careers, choices and leisure time can effectively do good.
Next Wednesday, this foundation will give a presentation for DWARS Groningen on how
we can make better choices for a better world. Doors open at 19.30 and at 20.00
hour, the presentation begins. We look forward to seeing you all on Wednesday!