Peter_Singer

We tend to be ethical only when our survival, and that of those we care about, is not at stake. One of the big present dangers to our present level of security is climate change, which could create a chaotic world with hundreds of millions of people who are unable to feed themselves, and become climate refugees, causing a chaotic world.

An effective altruist would always prefer to save 100 lives rather than just one.

I suppose I might be a political activist of some kind. Back in Australia in the '90s, I was a political candidate for the Greens. I didn't get elected, but support for the Greens has grown since then, and Green candidates have won the Senate seat for which I stood. I'm not sorry that I lost, because it was after that that I was offered the position at Princeton that has enabled me to have a lot more influence in discussions of the issues raised both in Animal Liberation and in The Most Good You Can Do but I often wonder what my life would have been like if I'd won. (Incidentally, Australia has proportional voting for the Senate, so it's not the case that I could have helped the worse candidate get elected, as Ralph Nader's candidacy did in the 2000 presidential election between Bush and Gore. I would not stand as a minor party candidate under those circumstances.)

Good question. Yes, effective altruists will consume less than typical Americans, or people in other affluent societies. They will get their excitement in other ways that don't cost a heap, or use a lot of fossil fuel. But we don't claim to be saints, so we aren't going around wearing sackcloth either.

Sponsoring an individual child is unlikely to be the most cost-effective way of helping poor individuals. That kind of appeal plays on our empathy with identifiable individuals, but there are better things to do with your money, as indicated by http://www.givewell.org or http://www.thelifeyoucansave.org