In particular, for donation to a particular charity to be a good idea, two conditions have to hold:
The sign of the expected utility has to be positive rather than negative.
The magnitude has to be greater than the expected utility of purchasing goods and services in the usual way (which generates benefit not only to you, but to your trading partners, to their trading partners etc.)
It is only moderately unlikely for either condition alone to be true, but it is very unlikely for both conditions to be true simultaneously.
In particular, for donation to a particular charity to be a good idea, two conditions have to hold:
The sign of the expected utility has to be positive rather than negative.
The magnitude has to be greater than the expected utility of purchasing goods and services in the usual way (which generates benefit not only to you, but to your trading partners, to their trading partners etc.)
It is only moderately unlikely for either condition alone to be true, but it is very unlikely for both conditions to be true simultaneously.