Utilitarianism and Effective Altruism

It is often taken as uncontroversial that Effective Altruism (EA) is friendly to utilitarianism. Given EA’s prominence, taking EA’s utilitarian-friendliness for granted allows for EA to define the perimeters of utilitarian practice, and blinds us to the possibility of utilitarian critiques of EA. Accordingly, in this thesis, I will explore how utilitarians might disagree with or disapprove of EA’s practices, as well as argue that EA stands to do better by sticking more closely to utilitarian principles.