Disclaimer: This blog post focuses on a new piece of research from Rethink Priorities. I was not involved with the funding or execution of this research, and therefore write this piece merely as a consumer. However, I am the Executive Director of Giving Green and a board member of Rethink Priorities, and acknowledge that these affiliations may bias my...
I am writing up two charity ideas I’ve wanted to investigate, but haven’t been able to, in the hopes someone will investigate them further. If you end up investigating either, I'd be most interested to see what conclusions you come to!
Vulture preservation as a global health intervention
Since the mid 1990's the vulture population in India has been rapidly declining. The reason is due to a few chemicals which are fed to livestock, which is highly poisonous to vultures.
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Summary
This post will summarize the trajectory of Wild Animal Initiative’s field-building for wild animal welfare science so far, along with patterns and indicators we want to see more of going forward. Beginning with an initial phase focused on establishing credibility and awareness of the field, through a second phase that has placed more emphasis on the distinctiveness and broad priorities of the field, we are now moving into a third phase designed to co...
This (2015) review reports that:
So broadly speaking I would expect the act(s) in question making public (or just making privately salient to you) a particular moral identity (as a person who acts well) would increase moral consistency effects, whereas acts which emphasis the amount of good you have done would increase licensing effects.
Super useful - thanks David. An interesting implication for EA fundraisers might be then to avoid quantifying achievements e.g. “you’ve just saved 10 lives with your donation”. Perhaps you’d want to say something like: “your commitment to helping others is fantastic”.
Is this the difference between "I'm a person who eats healthy" vs "I did such a good job avoiding cake at the staff party, so I deserve a couple cookies"?
That seems like one example that would fall within this, yes.