Name: The Most Good You Can Do
ISBN: 9780300180275

The Most Good You Can Do

From the ethicist the New Yorker calls “the most influential living philosopher,” a new way of thinking about living ethically 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 new movement in which his own ideas have played a crucial role: effective altruism. Effective altruism is built upon the simple but profound idea that living a fully ethical life involves doing the "most good you can do." Such a life requires an 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 living altruistically often leads to greater personal fulfillment than living for oneself. The Most Good You Can Do 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. The Most Good You Can Do offers new hope for our ability to tackle the world’s most pressing problems.

What Hacker News says

hilbertseriesSep 2020

This is nice, but money very likely goes further than time. The work done by volunteers in organizations is typically not that high impact and usually grunt work. If you work in a high paying industry such as tech, working money and donating it will absolutely have a larger impact than volunteering. I agree volunteering can have a greater personal benefit, but from a utilitarian standpoint donating is better. Peter Singer makes this argument very well in his book the most good you can do.

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j88439h84Jun 2020

Read "The most good you can do".

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yborisJan 2020

Effective Altruism has changed my life: I'm now giving at least 10% of my income to cost-effective charities thanks to the ideas behind the movement.

Good books to start with:

The Life You Can Save - Peter Singer

The Most Good You Can Do - Peter Singer

Doing Good Better - William MacAskill

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sarabandeMar 2018

His multiplier effect was higher by making tons of money and then giving it away, rather than working for charitable causes directly.

For example, take two simplified cases:

1. He makes a lot of money, and as a direct result of his fortune and generosity, he can effect [1000 employees * 10 years] = 10,000 man-years of charity work

2. He works directly at a charitable institution and performs 30 direct man-years of charity work, but makes no appreciable amount of money to multiply his efforts

If you're interested in a better explanation of this with regard to charity, I would check out Singer's book "The Most Good You Can Do", which is an exploration on the theory of effective altruism.

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randomstringFeb 2018

Another good book on effective altruism is The Most Good You Can Do by Peter Singer.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23168483-the-most-good-y...

It's clear that Bill and Melinda Gates are practicing effective altruism in an effort to do the most good with their money.

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msilenusSep 2015

I've read this book together with the two books about Effective Altruism bei Peter Singer (The Life You Can Save and The Most Good You Can Do), and I have to say these books have really changed my life. I know it sounds cheesy, but I've never read books that had such a lasting influence on me.

Those books provide just the right rational and scientific arguments and have shown me with how much cognitive dissonance I, as a supposed rational person, ran through my life.

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