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The Most Good You Can Do develops the challenges Singer has made to those who donate to the arts, and to charities focused on helping our fellow citizens, rather than those for whom we can do the most good. Effective altruists are extending our knowledge of the possibilities of living less selfishly, and of allowing reason, rather than emotion, to determine how we live. The Most Good You Can Do offers new hope for our ability to tackle the world's...
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Shift your attention to a more positive aspect of human nature -- our capacity for altruism. What causes some people to act selfishly, whereas others step in to help, even to their own detriment? Here, Professor Sanderson takes you into the world of evolution, empathy, decision-making, and more.
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Dissecting the phenomenon of altruism-as well as its mirror image, the instinct of self-preservation-is perhaps best accomplished with real-world case studies. This program does so as it documents the aftermath of the 2004 Asian tsunami. Following four independent relief workers in the hardest-hit areas of Sri Lanka, the film captures scene after scene in which the most idealistic and pragmatic of aims are vividly juxtaposed. Meanwhile, experts in...
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Although Ethiopia and the U.S. are worlds apart economically, citizens of both countries cite the same factors when asked what makes their lives meaningful. Is it possible that humanitarian ideals could play a part once a community's basic survival needs are met? This program discusses the role of altruism in personal happiness, profiling individuals from vastly different cultures who all say that helping others is key. Experts in positive psychology...
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This book is part introduction to, part reflective examination of, the idea and ideal of effective altruism. Its aim is to examine the core question of effective altruism: how can we best help others? A question that in turn forces us to contemplate what helping others, effectively or otherwise, really entails. Here the book argues that the greatest help we can provide is to reduce extreme suffering for all sentient beings, and then goes on to provide...
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Most of us want to make a difference. We donate our time and money to charities and causes we deem worthy, choose careers we consider meaningful, and patronize businesses and buy products we believe make the world a better place. Unfortunately, we often base these decisions on assumptions and emotions rather than facts. As a result, even our best intentions often lead to ineffective-and sometimes downright harmful-outcomes. How can we do better? While...
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"One of the most stunning achievements of moral philosophy is something we take for granted: moral universalism, or the idea that every human has equal moral worth. In What We Owe the Future, Oxford philosopher William MacAskill demands that we go a step further, arguing that people not only have equal moral worth no matter where or how they live, but also no matter when they live. This idea has implications beyond the obvious (climate change) - including...
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In his Guide to Being Awesome, Kid President--ten-year-old Robby Novak-- pulls together lists of awesome ideas to help the world, awesome interviews with his awesome celebrity friends (he has interviewed Beyonce!), and a step-by-step guide to make pretty much everything a little bit awesomer.
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"At fourteen, Amber could boast of killing her guinea pig, threatening to burn down her home, and seducing men in exchange for gifts. She used the tools she had available to get what she wanted, like all children. But unlike other children, she didn't care about the damage she inflicted. A few miles away, Lenny Skutnik cared so much about others that he jumped into an ice-cold river to save a drowning woman. What is responsible for the extremes of...
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Provides true accounts of ordinary kids showing extraordinary character. Thirty short stories are divided into six character traits (courage, creativity, kindness, persistence, resilience, and responsibility), and feature kids facing adversity from bullying in an American middle school to surviving persecution in the war-torn streets of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
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It's a belief that unites the left and right, psychologists and philosophers, writers and historians. It drives the headlines that surround us and the laws that touch our lives. From Machiavelli to Hobbes, Freud to Dawkins, the roots of this belief have sunk deep into Western thought. Human beings, we're taught, are by nature selfish and governed by self-interest. Humankind makes a new argument: that it is realistic, as well as revolutionary, to assume...
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The author relates how a chance encounter in a magic shop with a woman who taught him exercises to ease his sufferings and manifest his greatest desires gave him a glimpse of the relationship between the brain and the heart, and drove him to explore the neuroscience of compassion and altruism.
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"A children's story (ages 6-10) about Ashoka, the famed Indian emperor (c. 268 to 232 BCE), who began his rule with incredible violence and cruelty but later had a great transformation and became an important propagator of Buddhism. This telling will highlight the potential for transformation upon seeing the suffering caused by following one's own desires and discovering the joy in harnessing one's power and energy to benefit others"--