It is good that there are more organizations in this important area. However, it seems very strange which outcomes they list.
Let’s put it this way: I don’t care about how many people are dying of malaria. I just don’t. What I do care about is people dying, or suffering, of anything. That is why I find the attitude of AidGrade to be (almost) completely useless. The outcome I care about is maximizing QALYs, or maybe some other similar measure, and I actually don’t care about the listed outcomes at all, except for as much as optimizing on them may help people not suffer and die. Basically, AidGrade tries to help with our instrumental goals, and that is well and fine, but in the end what we are trying to optimize are our terminal goals, and AidGrade doesn’t help at that at all.
I agree with the spirit of this comment, but I think you are perhaps undervaluing the usefulness of helping with instrumental goals.
I am a huge fan of GiveWell/Giving What We Can, but one of the problems that many outsiders have with them is that they seem to have already made subjective value judgments on which things are more important. Remember that not everyone is into consequentialist ethics, and some find problems just with the concept of using QALYs.
Such people, when they first decide to start comparing charities, will not look at GiveWell/GWWC. They will look at something atrocious, like Charity Navigator. They will actually prefer Charity Navigator, since CN doesn’t introduce subjective value judgments, but just ranks by unimportant yet objective stuff like overhead costs.
Though I’ve only just browsed their site, I view AidGrade as a potential way to reach those people. The people who want straight numbers. People who maybe aren’t utilitarians, but recognize anyway that saving more is better than saving less, and so would use AidGrade to direct their funding to a better charity within whatever category they were going to donate to anyway. These people may not be swayed by traditional optimal philanthropy groups’ arguments on mosquito nets over hiv drugs. But by listening to AidGrade, perhaps they will at least redirect their funding from bad charities to better charities within whatever category they choose.
It is good that there are more organizations in this important area. However, it seems very strange which outcomes they list.
Let’s put it this way: I don’t care about how many people are dying of malaria. I just don’t. What I do care about is people dying, or suffering, of anything. That is why I find the attitude of AidGrade to be (almost) completely useless. The outcome I care about is maximizing QALYs, or maybe some other similar measure, and I actually don’t care about the listed outcomes at all, except for as much as optimizing on them may help people not suffer and die. Basically, AidGrade tries to help with our instrumental goals, and that is well and fine, but in the end what we are trying to optimize are our terminal goals, and AidGrade doesn’t help at that at all.
I agree with the spirit of this comment, but I think you are perhaps undervaluing the usefulness of helping with instrumental goals.
I am a huge fan of GiveWell/Giving What We Can, but one of the problems that many outsiders have with them is that they seem to have already made subjective value judgments on which things are more important. Remember that not everyone is into consequentialist ethics, and some find problems just with the concept of using QALYs.
Such people, when they first decide to start comparing charities, will not look at GiveWell/GWWC. They will look at something atrocious, like Charity Navigator. They will actually prefer Charity Navigator, since CN doesn’t introduce subjective value judgments, but just ranks by unimportant yet objective stuff like overhead costs.
Though I’ve only just browsed their site, I view AidGrade as a potential way to reach those people. The people who want straight numbers. People who maybe aren’t utilitarians, but recognize anyway that saving more is better than saving less, and so would use AidGrade to direct their funding to a better charity within whatever category they were going to donate to anyway. These people may not be swayed by traditional optimal philanthropy groups’ arguments on mosquito nets over hiv drugs. But by listening to AidGrade, perhaps they will at least redirect their funding from bad charities to better charities within whatever category they choose.