William MacAskill | |
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.jpg) MacAskill in 2015 | |
| Born | William David Crouch (1987-03-24)24 March 1987 (age 38) Glasgow, Scotland |
| Spouse | [1] |
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| Education |
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| Thesis | Normative Uncertainty (2014) |
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| Philosophical work | |
| Era | Contemporary philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
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| Website | williammacaskill |
William David MacAskill (néCrouch; born 24 March 1987)[2] is a Scottish philosopher and author, as well as one of the originators of theeffective altruism movement.[3][4][5] He was a Research Fellow at theGlobal Priorities Institute at theUniversity of Oxford, co-foundedGiving What We Can, theCentre for Effective Altruism and80,000 Hours,[6] and is the author ofDoing Good Better (2015)[7] andWhat We Owe the Future (2022),[8] and the co-author ofMoral Uncertainty (2020).[9]
MacAskill was born William Crouch in 1987 and grew up inGlasgow.[1][5][10] He was educated atHutchesons' Grammar School in Glasgow.[11] At the age of 15, after learning about how many people were dying as a result ofAIDS, he made the decision to work towards becoming wealthy and giving away half of his money.[12] At the age of 18, MacAskill readPeter Singer's 1972 essay "Famine, Affluence, and Morality", which motivated his philosophical and charitable interests.[5]
MacAskill earned hisBA in philosophy atJesus College, Cambridge in 2008 andBPhil atSt Edmund Hall, Oxford in 2010. He went on to be awarded aDPhil atSt Anne's College, Oxford in 2014 (spending a year as a visiting student atPrinceton University), supervised byJohn Broome andKrister Bykvist [sv].[citation needed] He then took up a junior research fellowship atEmmanuel College, Cambridge,[13] before being elected to an associate professorship at theUniversity of Oxford in association with a Fellowship atLincoln College, Oxford, which he left after one year.[14]
In 2009, MacAskill and fellow Oxford graduate studentToby Ord co-founded the organisationGiving What We Can to encourage people to pledge to donate 10% of their income to charities "that you sincerely believe to be among the most effective at improving the lives of others".[1][15] He co-founded the Centre for Effective Altruism in 2011 as an umbrella organisation of Giving What We Can and80,000 Hours,[16] which he co-founded with Benjamin Todd, to provide advice on how to use one's career to do the most good in the world.[1] In 2018, MacAskill gave aTED talk on effective altruism at the TED conference in Vancouver.[17]
MacAskill has worked as chair of the advisory board at theGlobal Priorities Institute at the University of Oxford[18] and Director of the Forethought Foundation for Global Priorities Research.[19]
He was associated withSam Bankman-Fried for a number of years and reportedly dismissed claims that Bankman-Fried was engaging in inappropriate conduct as a "he said-she said" during an effort in 2018 to oust Bankman-Fried from control of the now-failed trading firmAlameda Research.[20] He was a member of theFTX Future Fund, which granted $160 million toeffective altruism causes in 2022, including $33 million to organizations directly connected to MacAskill.[20] Following thebankruptcy of FTX, MacAskill and the rest of the team resigned from the fund.[21]
In 2022, as tech magnateElon Musk sought funding for hispurchase of Twitter, MacAskill liaised between Musk and Bankman-Fried. Musk and MacAskill were previously acquainted; Musk describedWhat We Owe the Future as "a close match for my philosophy".[22] MacAskill contacted Musk to arrange a conversation with Bankman-Fried, describing him as "my collaborator".[20] Ultimately, Bankman-Fried, whose corporate ventures were facing a case,United States v. Bankman-Fried, did not participate in the acquisition.[23]
One of the main focuses of MacAskill's research has been how one ought to make decisions under normative uncertainty; this was the topic of his DPhil thesis,[24] as well as articles inEthics,[25]Mind[26] andThe Journal of Philosophy.[27]
MacAskill's first book,Doing Good Better, was published in 2015.[28][29][30][31] MacAskill argues that many of the ways people think about doing good achieve very little, but that by applying data andscientific reasoning to doing good, people can have a much larger positive impact. For example, the book proposes thatfair trade does very little to help thepoorest farmers, that boycotting sweatshops is bad for theglobal poor,[29] and that people who pursue high-income careers could do more good than charity workers by donating large portions of their wealth to effective charities, i.e.earning to give.[31] However, in the same year the book was published, MacAskill deemphasised earning to give, saying "only a small proportion of people should earn to give long term".[32]
MacAskill's second book,What We Owe the Future, makes the case forlongtermism.[33][34][35]: 35–36 His argument has three parts: first, future people count morally as much as the people alive today; second, the future is immense because humanity may survive for a very long time; and third, the future could be very good or very bad, and our actions could make the difference. The book also discusses how bad the end of humanity would be, which depends on whether the future will be good or bad and whether it is morally good for happy people to be born—a key question inpopulation ethics. He concludes that the future will likely be positive on balance if humanity survives.[35]
MacAskill (born Crouch) argued that men should considerchanging their last names when they get married. He and his now ex-wife,Amanda Askell, changed their last name to "MacAskill", her maternal grandmother's maiden name.[36] MacAskill and his former wife authored articles together on topics of ethical debate[37][38] before their separation in 2015 and later divorce.[1]
MacAskill has experienced both anxiety and depression. As of 2022, he lives inOxford.[1] Out of concern foranimal welfare, he isvegetarian.[10][39]
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