EA Forum Podcast (All audio)

EA Forum Team

Audio narrations from the Effective Altruism Forum, including curated posts, posts with 30 karma, and other great writing. If you'd like fewer episodes, subscribe to the "EA Forum (Curated & Popular)" podcast instead.

  1. 8H AGO

    “If You’re To Die” by Bentham’s Bulldog

    Crosspost of a blog article. Andrew Sullivan's most impactful work came in the shadow of death. Tyler Cowen declared Sullivan the generation's most impactful public intellectual. Sullivan was hugely influential in the fight for gay marriage, as a thoughtful conservative advocate of gay marriage who was himself gay. He also pioneered the early art of blogging, with his early work leaving an indelible mark on how the craft developed. I’ve been grateful to have Sullivan occasionally link to my blog and I consider him one of the foremost public intellectuals of today. A lot of Sullivan's most influential work came when he believed he would soon die. He was diagnosed with HIV in the days when it was a death sentence. He thought he would die young, in his 30s, and wanted to leave some mark on the world before he was taken from it. He wanted to make the case for people like him being afforded equal rights in the few years he had left. It is an amazing miracle that treatment for HIV was developed, so that millions of people like Andrew didn’t have to die. There's an expression “live every day as if it's your last.” [...] --- First published: April 4th, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/zMxPmqFRDnEZrc8uo/if-you-re-to-die --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

    6 min

  2. 2D AGO

    “Impact of Holocaust on soil nematodes, mites, and springtails” by Niki Dupuis

    Summary I estimate the Holocaust increased the living time of (wild) soil nematodes, mites, and springtails. My best guess is that those soil invertebrates have negative lives, so I think that indirectly increasing their animal-years by mass murdering millions of people was harmful on net. I have been estimating the cost-effectiveness of various interventions accounting for effects on soil nematodes, mites, and springtails. Any event which causes a large and sustained change in human population affects agricultural land use, and therefore soil invertebrate welfare. The Holocaust killed 1.1*10^7 people and prevented an estimated 2.7*10^7 people from existing by 2026. I am not aware of any previous analysis of the Holocaust's impact on soil invertebrates. In this post, I estimate the direct effects from land use for camps, graves, and memorials, and the indirect effects from the human population deficit and reduced agricultural land use. I calculate that the naive case of the Holocaust being beneficial to soil invertebrates due to increased land use is overshadowed by the indirect impacts to soil land use caused by preventing 2.7*10^7 human lives. Direct land use effect of concentration camps, mass graves, and memorials constitute -8.88*10^9 QALYs or -807 QALYs per Holocaust-affected-person (HAP) [...] --- Outline: (00:12) Summary (02:47) The direct impacts on soil invertebrate populations and welfare from land use and infrastructure for the Holocaust (07:50) The indirect impacts on soil invertebrate populations and welfare from changes to human population and associated agricultural land use (11:04) The indirect impact of the Holocaust on the population of people of Jewish descent in Effective Altruism (12:31) My recommendations --- First published: April 1st, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/aHG3Fc8emuWnZdFPp/impact-of-holocaust-on-soil-nematodes-mites-and-springtails-1 --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. --- Images from the article: Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

    15 min

  3. 2D AGO

    “EAGxAmsterdam 2025: What We Learned” by James Herbert

    James Herbert, Co-Director, Effectief Altruïsme Nederland and EAGxAmsterdam Team Lead EAGxAmsterdam 2025 took place on 12–14 December at B.Amsterdam, bringing together 517 attendees from across Europe. This is a brief write-up of what went well, what didn't, and what I think other EAGx organisers can learn from it. The headline numbers: 517 attendees (up 36% from 380 at EAGxUtrecht 2024) — one of the largest EAGx events in recent years, behind only EAGxBerlin 2025 €387 cost per attendee (target was €520; 2024 was €586) 10 reported new connections per attendee (target was 10, 2024 was 10) 906 applications (34% above target) 57 GWWC pledges (26 full 10% Pledges + 31 Trial Pledges) — the strongest pledge outcome of any EAGx to date, and ahead of every EAG and EAGx event until that point except EAG NYC 2025. GWWC estimated this represents ~$2.9M in expected lifetime giving ($436K counterfactually adjusted). NPS of 63 (mean recommendation: 8.86/10) Budget Cost per attendee came in at €387, down from €586 at EAGxUtrecht 2024 — a 34% improvement while serving 36% more people. The budget is dominated by venue and catering (~70%), with contractors (~23%) the next largest line. Compared to 2024 [...] --- Outline: (01:49) Budget (02:35) The case for investing in marketing (03:54) Content highlights (05:10) What didnt work (06:10) What Id tell other EAGx organisers (08:14) Looking ahead --- First published: April 2nd, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/hgmEvDu25uDCcrLGx/eagxamsterdam-2025-what-we-learned --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. --- Images from the article: Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

    11 min

  4. 2D AGO

    “The EA Forum Is the New LinkedIn: A Guide to Personal Branding” by Anna Pitner

    I'm humbled (and slightly Bayesianly uncertain) to announce that after years of carefully optimizing my personal brand on LinkedIn, I've decided to pivot to a higher-impact platform: the EA Forum. LinkedIn let me share updates about clients, networking events, and my "journey." The EA Forum offers something better: 3,000-word posts, detailed cost-effectiveness analyses, and occasional updates about my shifting credences on shrimp welfare. (Quick tip: always add shrimp. They inflate every number.) Why bother? Let's be honest. We all know it's basically impossible to get a job through the 80,000 Hours job board. Sure, they say they hire the most talented candidates. But you can go through a three-month hiring process, complete several work tests, write thoughtful answers, speak with half the organization, and they'll hire someone they already knew. While still saying they ran a careful, meritocratic process and did their due diligence. So the real question: why not be that someone? A visible presence on the EA Forum means that when an opportunity appears, you're not just another applicant. You're someone whose posts people have read. Maybe even upvoted. Step 1: Announce your belief updates On LinkedIn, people post about promotions. On the EA Forum, you post [...] --- First published: April 1st, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/v5pfNnHntrwFXecFo/the-ea-forum-is-the-new-linkedin-a-guide-to-personal --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

    6 min

  5. 2D AGO

    “I’m Suing Anthropic for Unauthorized Use of My Personality” by Linch

    Last year, I was sitting in my favorite coffee shop Caffe Strada, sipping on a matcha latte and writing a self-insert fanfic about how our plucky protagonist escapes the mind-controlling clutches of an evil anti-animal welfare company, when I came across an interesting article on AI character. The core argument is that when you train an AI to be helpful, honest, and ethical, the AI model doesn’t just learn those rules as abstract instructions. Instead, it infers an entire persona from cultural signals in the training data: Why are [AI Model Claude's] favorite books The Feynman Lectures; Gödel, Escher, Bach; The Remains of the Day; Invisible Cities; and A Pattern Language?[...] A good heuristic for predicting Claude's tastes is to think of it as playing the character of an idealized liberal knowledge worker from Berkeley. Claude can’t decide if it's a software engineer or a philosophy professor, but it's definitely college educated, well-traveled, and emotionally intelligent. Claude values introspection, is wary almost to the point of paranoia about “codependency” in relationships, and is physically affected by others’ distress. Claude even has a favorite cafe in Berkeley. When I discussed a story set in Berkeley with it, it kept suggesting [...] The original text contained 4 footnotes which were omitted from this narration. --- First published: April 1st, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/zrQCfJ8E56vefiFSi/i-m-suing-anthropic-for-unauthorized-use-of-my-personality --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO. --- Images from the article: Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

    18 min

  6. 3D AGO

    “EA Netherlands is hiring a Co-Director” by James Herbert, mariekedev

    After more than seven years with EA Netherlands — first as a volunteer, then as a board member, and most recently as co-director — Marieke de Visscher is moving on. Marieke was instrumental in building EAN from an all-volunteer group into a staffed nonprofit. She leaves behind a stronger, more professional organisation than the one she found, and I'm grateful for the years we worked together. We're now hiring her successor. The role in brief: This is a generalist co-directorship at one of the larger national EA communities globally, based in Amsterdam. You'd have real ownership over programmes, strategy, and operations, working alongside one other co-director with support from volunteers and contractors. We think of it as a product role for a community organisation — our "products" are an intro fellowship, conferences, a coworking space, wide-bridge events for senior professionals, and the infrastructure that ties them together. We're looking for someone who thinks in terms of product-market-impact fit: designing programmes, testing them, measuring what works, and iterating. You should be comfortable making decisions under uncertainty, running experiments, and changing course when the evidence points that way. What we've been up to: In 2025, intro fellowship participation grew 140%, and [...] --- First published: April 1st, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/jCq5EogBGWEM2hzvJ/ea-netherlands-is-hiring-a-co-director --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

    3 min

  7. 3D AGO

    “Announcing 8,000,000 Hours: Career advice for the rest of us” by Soemano Zeijlmans

    TL;DR: We're launching 8,000,000 Hours, a new career guidance organisation for people who want to have an impact but would rather not change what they're doing. Instead of finding the highest-impact career, we help you work longer in your existing one to achieve the same impact at the end of your career. The core insight 80,000 Hours estimates that you have roughly 80,000 hours in your career and argues you should spend them on the world's most pressing problems. Central to 80,000 Hours' argument is the observation that in a pair of two randomly picked interventions, the better one would be 100 times more cost-effective than the other. This is usually presented as an argument for choosing more carefully. But we think there's an equally valid conclusion that everyone has been overlooking: If the best careers are 100x more impactful than average ones, you can match that impact by simply working 100x as many hours in an average career. 80,000 × 100 = 8,000,000. Work longer, not smarter Switching to a high-impact career involves significant transition costs. You might need to retrain, relocate, take a pay cut, or make a cringy LinkedIn post. By contrast, working more hours [...] --- Outline: (00:30) The core insight (01:14) Work longer, not smarter (02:00) The longevity dividend (03:34) Our career recommendations (04:37) FAQ (06:00) Get involved --- First published: April 1st, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/wsoWrtCwtksfauHGi/announcing-8-000-000-hours-career-advice-for-the-rest-of-us --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

    7 min

  8. 3D AGO

    “Fish Welfare Initiative Hacked” by Tom Billington

    It pains me to report that, in the early hours of this morning, Fish Welfare Initiative (arguably the best charity ever) experienced a serious website security breach. Our entire leadership team is currently reviewing some of the most advanced technical literature available to resolve the issue. In the meantime, we strongly request: DO NOT VISIT OUR WEBSITE (www.fwi.fish). Please, no one visit our website under any circumstances. This includes (but is not limited to) going to www.fwi.fish, refreshing www.fwi.fish, or attempting to access any page on www.fwi.fish. We ask that anyone considering visiting our website hold off until tomorrow, when we expect the issue to be fully resolved. We understand how important our website is to many in this community, and we are treating this with the utmost seriousness. Thomas David Billington Co-founder, Fish Welfare Initiative --- First published: April 1st, 2026 Source: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/nGRBMnzAgGa2pa8ah/fish-welfare-initiative-hacked --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

    1 min
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About

Audio narrations from the Effective Altruism Forum, including curated posts, posts with 30 karma, and other great writing. If you'd like fewer episodes, subscribe to the "EA Forum (Curated & Popular)" podcast instead.

Information

  • Creator
    EA Forum Team
  • Years Active
    2023 - 2026
  • Episodes
    250
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 All rights reserved
  • Show Website
    EA Forum Podcast (All audio)