As a moral calculus, the decision is a no brainer.
Not unless you agree with the charity in question. Say some people request a pro-life charity, and some people request a pro-choice charity; some people want to donate to African aid agencies, and some people want to oppose African aid agencies because they think they’re harmful. Depending on the charity chosen, many people would want to oppose this decision.
Indeed, there are huge differences between how much good the best charities accomplish and how much good the middle of the road charities accomplish. I am not sure why this was downvoted.
That’s true, I suppose, but it shouldn’t be hard to make sure that a sizable minority of the funds are doing real good in the world. I’m very open to ideas as to how to optimally have a community distribute the money, but that seems like a problem that we can solve when we get there. I also expect that Craig and Jim themselves would have strong opinions about the charities involved. I’m going to put a top level post up shortly; we can move all discussion there.
Not unless you agree with the charity in question. Say some people request a pro-life charity, and some people request a pro-choice charity; some people want to donate to African aid agencies, and some people want to oppose African aid agencies because they think they’re harmful. Depending on the charity chosen, many people would want to oppose this decision.
Using meta-charities like GiveWell might help make the choice of charity less controversial.
Indeed, there are huge differences between how much good the best charities accomplish and how much good the middle of the road charities accomplish. I am not sure why this was downvoted.
That’s true, I suppose, but it shouldn’t be hard to make sure that a sizable minority of the funds are doing real good in the world. I’m very open to ideas as to how to optimally have a community distribute the money, but that seems like a problem that we can solve when we get there. I also expect that Craig and Jim themselves would have strong opinions about the charities involved. I’m going to put a top level post up shortly; we can move all discussion there.