EA Forum Podcast (All audio)

I've had a lot of people reach out to me who are interested in working

on biosecurity, but have a background in software engineering /

computer science. A lot of these conversations have looked something

like:

A: I'd be really excited to work on biosecurity, it seems really

important and relatively

neglected. Are you hiring for software engineers at SecureBio?

Me: I wish we were, you seem really great! But I don't know when we

will be, depends on funding and some strategy questions.

This has now changed, and SecureBio is now hiring for two different

software engineering roles that don't require a biology background:

Engineer. An in-person role on the project I lead, developing a

metagenomic biosurveillance system to detect stealth

pathogens.

Engineer, AI Safety and Biosecurity. An remote role [...]

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First published:

October 23rd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/8zyMEBhDch9PCuyu5/software-engineering-at-securebio

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This is a link post.

In Ugandan villages where non-governmental organisations (NGOs) hired away the existing government health worker, infant mortality went up.

This happened in 39%[1] of villages that already had a government worker. The NGO arrived with funding and good intentions, but the likelihood that villagers received care from any health worker declined by ~23%.

Brain Misallocation

“Brain drain”, - the movement of people from poorer countries to wealthier ones, has been extensively discussed for decades[2]. But there's a different dynamic that gets far less attention: “brain misallocation”.

In many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), the brightest talents are being incentivised towards organisations that don’t utilise their potential for national development. They’re learning how to get grants from multilateral alphabet organisations rather than build businesses or make good policy. This isn’t about talent leaving the country. It's about talent being misdirected and mistrained within it.

Examples

Nick Laing [...]

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Outline:

(00:36) Brain Misallocation

(01:16) Examples

(05:37) The Incentive Trap

(07:48) When Help Becomes Harm

(08:48) Conclusion

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First published:

October 23rd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/6rmdyddEateJFWb4L/the-charity-trap-brain-misallocation

Linkpost URL:
https://gdea.substack.com/p/the-charity-trap-brain-misallocation

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This is a link post.

We call for a prohibition on the development of superintelligence, not lifted before there is

1. broad scientific consensus that it will be done safely and controllably, and
2. strong public buy-in.

Sign on the main website or Eko[1].

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First published:

October 22nd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/nkjguqdyxzwsrGmKB/statement-on-superintelligence-fli-open-letter

Linkpost URL:
https://superintelligence-statement.org/

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

All quotes are from their blog post "Why we chose to invest another $100 million in cash transfers", highlights are my own:

Today, we’re announcing a new $100 million USD commitment over the next four years to expand our partnership with GiveDirectly and help empower an additional 185,000 people living in extreme poverty. We’re also funding new research, and pilot variants, to further understand how we can maximize the impact of each dollar.

This is on top of another $50 million USD they gave to GiveDirectly before:

We started partnering with GiveDirectly in 2021. Since then, we’ve donated $50 million USD to support their work across Malawi, through direct cash transfers to those living in extreme poverty. We’ve already reached more than 85,000 people, helping to provide life changing resources and the dignity of choice.

For context, the Cash for Poverty Relief program by Give Directly [...]

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Outline:

(01:24) About their founding-to-give model

(02:15) Other Engagement

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First published:

October 22nd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ktFpWLkvRAAygbbtH/canva-to-donate-usd100m-over-4-years-to-givedirectly

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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Images from the article:

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This is a link post.

Written in my personal capacity, and am speaking for myself and not the effective altruism community as a whole.

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First published:

October 22nd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/sCbW6kvzx2ReXru4P/consider-donating-to-ai-safety-champion-scott-wiener

Linkpost URL:
https://ericneyman.wordpress.com/2025/10/22/consider-donating-to-ai-safety-champion-scott-wiener/

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

TL;DR

• AI systems manage hundreds of thousands of animals in NZ (billions globally) under decades-old regulations with zero AI-specific welfare provisions
• I spent 3 months part-time + $0 writing a policy brief highlighting this gap for local policymakers
• The pattern is universal: deploy first, regulate later (maybe)
• The resulting policy brief proposes practical solutions using existing frameworks
• Takeaway: this work is doable without massive resources, similar gaps likely exist in your jurisdiction and the window of opportunity is closing

Introduction

AI systems are already being deployed to manage potentially billions of animals across agriculture and wildlife control, with essentially zero welfare-specific regulation. The regulatory frameworks being established right now, in the next 1-3 years, will likely lock in for decades. And almost no one is working on this.

EA has strong work on AI safety and animal welfare separately, but the intersection is only beginning to be explored. [...]

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Outline:

(00:13) TL;DR

(00:53) Introduction

(02:27) Aotearoa New Zealand case study

(04:35) The Regulatory Context and Pattern

(06:09) Global AI governance: the animal welfare gap

(07:19) Why This Was Doable

(08:30) Four Implementation Insights

(10:24) Practical Pathways

(11:43) So what's next?

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First published:

October 20th, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/G3bsSL2LoKSN4Cyic/ai-and-animal-welfare-a-policy-case-study-from-aotearoa-new

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Disclaimer: I work for the Centre for Effective Altruism, though these are purely my personal thoughts and should not be taken to represent my employer or any other organization. I'm interested in this topic as someone who values organizational transparency and financial accountability across the nonprofit sector, not because of any organizational mandate.

TLDR: 

After 50+ years of for-profit companies having international accounting standards, nonprofits finally have their own: INPAS (International Non-Profit Accounting Standard), launched in October 2025. This could make it easier to compare nonprofits across borders, reduce administrative overhead, and build donor trust. However, adoption is uncertain and there are legitimate concerns about implementation burden.

Why this matters (even if accounting sounds boring)

Picture this: You're trying to decide between two global health charities. One operates in Kenya, the other in India. You want to know which uses unrestricted funds more efficiently. But their financial statements use [...]

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Outline:

(00:34) TLDR:

(01:05) Why this matters (even if accounting sounds boring)

(01:54) What problem is this actually solving?

(03:17) The case for cautious optimism

(04:42) The case for skepticism

(05:24) What could the EA community do about this?

(06:39) My tentative take

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First published:

October 22nd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/q6mrfbyY7btumHeB2/the-first-global-accounting-standard-for-nonprofits-just

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

This is the latest in a series of essays on AI Scaling.
You can find the others on my site.

Summary: RL-training for LLMs scales surprisingly poorly. Most of its gains are from allowing LLMs to productively use longer chains of thought, allowing them to think longer about a problem. There is some improvement for a fixed length of answer, but not enough to drive AI progress. Given the scaling up of pre-training compute also stalled, we'll see less AI progress via compute scaling than you might have thought, and more of it will come from inference scaling (which has different effects on the world). That lengthens timelines and affects strategies for AI governance and safety.

The current era of improving AI capabilities using reinforcement learning (from verifiable rewards) involves two key types of scaling:

1. Scaling the amount of compute used for RL during training
2. Scaling [...]

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Outline:

(09:12) How do these compare to pre-training scaling?

(13:42) Conclusion

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First published:

October 22nd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/TysuCdgwDnQjH3LyY/how-well-does-rl-scale

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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Images from the article:

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This is a link post.

I am not American. But compared to China, I have plenty of friends from the U.S., Australia is more culturally similar to the U.S., and I have spent more time there. So, is the fact that I support the U.S. over China in the AI race just selfish and downstream of my personal circumstances?

I would like to think not. But it is worth seriously considering what the future would be like if the CCP becomes the dominant player in AI development. Dominance in AI development could (but would not necessarily) give China a decisive strategic advantage and control over the galactic future. Here, I think through what a CCP-led future would mean for human flourishing, and avoiding risks from misalignment and war.[1]

Present-day harms

I care about creating a Better Future – not just today's world minus poverty and disease, but a utopian future [...]

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Outline:

(00:57) Present-day harms

(04:20) A Flourishing Future

(07:14) Avoiding AI catastrophe

(09:39) Conclusion

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First published:

October 22nd, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/ZjYBgqGHxMmDaNvzt/how-good-would-a-ccp-dominated-ai-future-be

Linkpost URL:
https://oscardelaney.substack.com/p/how-good-would-a-ccp-dominated-ai

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

Epistemic status: quickly writtren, rehashing (reheating?) old, old takes. Also, written in a grumpier voice than I’d endorse (I got rained on this morning).

Some essays on longtermism came out recently! Perhaps you noticed. I overall think these essays were just fine[1], and that we should all talk less about longtermism.

In which I talk about longtermism

(In what follows, I’ll take “longtermism” as shorthand for: “the effects of our actions on the long term future should be a key moral priority.")

Critics often have two[2] broad kinds of objections to longtermism:

1. It's too revisionary or radical in its implications
2. It's not action-guiding, it's irrelevant in its implications

Here I’ll say a bit more on (2). Specifically, I’m going to argue that (A) longtermism isn’t necessary to motivate most high priority work, and that ((B) for the work longtermism might be necessary to motivate, talking about object-level features [...]

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Outline:

(00:33) In which I talk about longtermism

(01:24) Longtermism doesn't distinctively motivate much work

(03:26) Longtermists act like normal people, mostly

(05:01) What about work that seemingly does need longtermism?

(05:45) Some concrete recommendations

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First published:

October 20th, 2025

Source:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/eHa3mP86ecvYnb78x/talking-about-longtermism-isn-t-very-important

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.