Author

William MacAskill

16 key ideas across 2 books, each explained in our own words.

Doing Good Better

IDEA 1
Good intentions are not enough
MacAskill opens with the story of PlayPumps, merry-go-rounds designed to pump water in African villages. They attracted praise and funding but worked worse than ordinary pumps, showing that well-meant projects can fail.
IDEA 2
Ask five key questions
MacAskill offers five questions for doing good: how many people benefit and by how much, is this the most effective thing you can do, is the area neglected, what would have happened otherwise and what are the chances of success.
IDEA 3
Measure benefits carefully
MacAskill explains measures like quality-adjusted life years, which estimate how much a health programme improves lives. Such measures help compare very different programmes. Numbers make comparisons possible. Comparison becomes fairer.

IDEA 1
Future people matter
MacAskill argues that people who will live in the future matter just as much as people alive today. Because the future could last a very long time and include vast numbers of people, protecting it may be one of the most important things we can do.
IDEA 2
Longtermism shapes priorities
MacAskill calls this view longtermism: positively influencing the long-term future is a key moral priority. He argues that we can take actions now that will shape the world for centuries.
IDEA 3
Values can become locked in
MacAskill warns that values could become locked in, for example through powerful technologies or governments. If bad values become permanent, the future could be much worse. Lock-in could be hard to undo.

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