Beeminder's an evidence-based willpower augmention tool that collects quantifiable data about your life, then helps you organize it into commitment mechanisms so you can keep resolutions. They've also got a blog about what they're doing here
Altruisto is a browser extension so that when you shop online, a portion of the money you pay goes to effective charities (no extra cost to you). Just install an extension and when you buy something, people in poverty will get medicines, bed nets, or financial aid.
MealSquares is a "nutritionally complete" food that contains a balanced diet worth of nutrients in a few tasty easily measurable units. Think Soylent, except zero preparation, made with natural ingredients, and looks/tastes a lot like an ordinary scone.
B4X is a free and open source developer tool that allows users to write apps for Android, iOS, and more.
Seattle Anxiety Specialists are a therapy practice helping people overcome anxiety and related mental health issues (eg GAD, OCD, PTSD) through evidence based interventions and self-exploration. Check out their free anti-anxiety guide here
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AISafety.com hosts a Skype reading group Wednesdays at 19:45 UTC, reading new and old articles on different aspects of AI Safety. We start with a presentation of a summary of the article, and then discuss in a friendly atmosphere.
80,000 Hours researches different problems and professions to help you figure out how to do as much good as possible. Their free career guide show you how to choose a career that's fulfilling and maximises your contribution to solving the world's most pressing problems.
Support Slate Star Codex on Patreon. I have a day job and SSC gets free hosting, so don't feel pressured to contribute. But extra cash helps pay for contest prizes, meetup expenses, and me spending extra time blogging instead of working.
Jane Street is a quantitative trading firm with a focus on technology and collaborative problem solving. We're always hiring talented programmers, traders, and researchers and have internships and fulltime positions in New York, London, and Hong Kong. No background in finance required.
The Effective Altruism newsletter provides monthly updates on the highest-impact ways to do good and help others.
Substack is a blogging site that helps writers earn money and readers discover articles they'll like.
Metaculus is a platform for generating crowd-sourced predictions about the future, especially science and technology. If you're interested in testing yourself and contributing to their project, check out their questions page
Norwegian founders with an international team on a mission to offer the equivalent of a Norwegian social safety net globally available as a membership. Currently offering travel medical insurance for nomads, and global health insurance for remote teams.
Dr. Laura Baur is a psychiatrist with interests in literature review, reproductive psychiatry, and relational psychotherapy; see her website for more. Note that due to conflict of interest she doesn't treat people in the NYC rationalist social scene.
The COVID-19 Forecasting Project at the University of Oxford is making advanced pandemic simulations of 150+ countries available to the public, and also offer pro-bono forecasting services to decision-makers.
Giving What We Can is a charitable movement promoting giving some of your money to the developing world or other worthy causes. If you're interested in this, consider taking their Pledge as a formal and public declaration of intent.
Tag Archives: philosophy
I Myself Am A Scientismist
I. “Science can tell you about rocks and molecules and stars. But what kind of science can tell you about the deepest recesses of the human soul?” I hear this a lot, and I want to answer “Psychology! It’s this … Continue reading
The What-You’d-Implicitly-Heard-Before Telling Thing
G. K. Chesterton, whom I praised yesterday, is also famous for the argument of the “truth-telling thing”: “This, therefore, is, in conclusion, my reason for accepting the religion and not merely the scattered and secular truths out of the religion. … Continue reading
Ambijectivity
The statement “Mozart’s music is better than Beethoven’s” is usually considered a subjective opinion. But this statement has the same form as “Mozart’s music is better than the music of the three-year old girl who lives upstairs from me and … Continue reading
Utilitarianism for Engineers, Part II
You know how it’s impossible even in principle to compare people’s utilities and so utilitarianism is a pipe dream that can never possibly work? Well, I just learned Tufts has a searchable public database of utilities for various health outcomes. … Continue reading
Proving Too Much
The fallacy of Proving Too Much is when you challenge an argument because, in addition to proving its intended conclusion, it also proves obviously false conclusions. For example, if someone says “You can’t be an atheist, because it’s impossible to … Continue reading
Last Thoughts On Virtue Ethics
The discussion on the other posts has sort of degenerated into people pointing out that our intuitive moral sense is a whole lot more useful most of the time than the speculations of moral philosophers, therefore virtue ethics. I have … Continue reading
Read History Of Philosophy Backwards
Back when I was in college, my chief complaint about my philosophy course was that it spent all its time teaching stuff by Aristotle or Plato or Descartes that was just obviously wrong. I sort of annoyed my professors by … Continue reading
Book Review: After Virtue
A few weeks ago the blogosphere discovered Ayn Rand’s margin notes on a C.S. Lewis book. They were everything I expected and more. Lewis would make an argument, and then Rand would write a stream of invective in the margin … Continue reading
Whose Utilitarianism?
[Trigger warning: attempt to ground morality] God help me, I’m starting to have doubts about utilitarianism. Whose Superstructure? The first doubt is something like this. Utilitarianism requires a complicated superstructure – a set of meta-rules about how to determine utilitarian … Continue reading