Arete Fellowship

An Introduction to Effective Altruism

Application Deadline:
Saturday, September 16th @11:59 P.M

Duke Effective Altruism is inviting applications for the sixth session of the Arete Fellowship, a selective program — now offered at dozens of universities across the world — that will offer an accelerated introduction to Effective Altruism for students who are highly motivated to think rationally about their potential to have a positive impact on the world.

Fellowship Structure

The Fellowship takes place over the course of the 2023 Fall semester. We expect to accept 15 Fellows. There will be a discussion series with 8 meetings (each approximately 90 mins), 2+ group socials with all Fellows as well as members of the broader Duke EA community, as well as academic/career advising. Meetings will take place on weekends. Timings will be flexible and will be arranged once Fellows have been selected. Each discussion will consist of a set of study resources and an in-person discussion. The resources will take approximately 90 mins to go through and must be completed in preparation for the meeting.

Fellows will participate in discussions in pods. Each pod will consist of ~5 Fellows and 1 facilitator — someone who has done Arete before or helped to put together the syllabus, there to guide discussion (or to sit back and enjoy discussion amongst Fellows!). Along with communication of information, one of the primary goals of Arete is to build community within the class of Fellows. Through socials and discussions, Fellows will get to know each other, as well as more seasoned members of Duke EA. (We have a really wonderful group of people!)

The weekly time of the discussion meeting is TBD. We will have several different sessions at different times each weekend. We will decide times democratically, once Fellows have been selected.

Curriculum Overview

Our discussion series will cover the following topics:

  1. An Introduction to Effective Altruism 🌱

  2. Cause Prioritization & the Science(?) of Doing Good

  3. Causes I: Global Poverty, Global Health & Animal Welfare

  4. Causes II: Climate Change, Long-Termism & Movement-Building

  5. Causes III: Global Catastrophic Risks: Biological, Nuclear & AI

  6. Your 80,000 Hours: Having Career Impact

  7. Fellow-Chosen Discussion Topics!

  8. Graduation 🎉

Expectations

  • We expect fellows to embody these four traits:

    1. Enthusiasm to do good better

    2. Action-orientation

    3. Openness to novel ideas

    4. Scientific mindset

  • A central part of the EA mindset is taking seriously ideas that may seem counter-intuitive or even uncomfortable. Some of the most exciting opportunities to do good exist precisely because they are not mainstream and remain unexploited. As such, Fellows should expect to have their beliefs and life-plans challenged.

  • During the Fellowship, we will cover a wide range of fields and methodologies. No subject knowledge is required — the program is designed to be self-contained, so Fellows should not worry if they are not familiar with, say, philosophy, economics, biology, or technology. EA is necessarily intellectual in some ways, but this Fellowship is *not* *just* an intellectual exercise— we hope Fellows will be eager to incorporate these ideas into their daily lives and long-term plans.

  • Participants should treat the Fellowship like a Duke House Course with an hour and a half of homework and an hour and a half of “class-time” per week. To complete the Fellowship, Fellows will also be required to make a short “lightning talk” on a relevant topic of their choice at the end of the Spring.

    Fellows must complete materials and attend meetings weekly. If a Fellow cannot attend a meeting, they should let Duke EA organizers know beforehand, and we will try to set up another time to discuss the week’s materials 1-on-1. If a Fellow misses too many meetings, they will be asked to withdraw and apply to another cohort. Fellows will also be expected to attend Arete socials.