This week's learning objectives

Learning objectives

By the end of this week, you will be able to:

• Read a charity evaluation critically, identifying the chain of reasoning and its weakest links

• Place evidence on the hierarchy of reliability (from RCTs to testimonials)

• Trace the logic of a cost-effectiveness model and identify where judgement calls enter

• Explain how moral weights shape which interventions get funded—and why that matters

• Build a simple cost-effectiveness estimate for an intervention using publicly available data

• Engage with critiques of the evidence-based approach, including questions of power and perspective

These aren’t just things to know—they’re skills you’ll practise and get feedback on.

Time commitment

• Reading: ~65 minutes (Singer chapter + course text + GiveWell moral weights post + GiveWell methodology page + Karnofsky blog post)

• Quiz: ~10 minutes (6 MCQs on Circle)

• Workbook: ~60 minutes (writing exercises in your workbook)

• Total pre-session work: ~2–2.5 hours

You’ll need: the Week 2 workbook (downloadable below). Complete the reading first, then do the quiz on Circle, then work through your workbook. Bring your completed workbook to the session.

Why this matters

Last week, you learned that some ways of doing good are much more effective than others—perhaps by a factor of 100x or more. You also learned about scope insensitivity: our brains don’t naturally track differences of this magnitude. If we can’t trust our intuitions to scale, we need tools that do.

This week gives you those tools. You’ll learn to read and critique a charity evaluation—to pick apart an organisation’s impact claims, identify where evidence is strong or weak, and understand the assumptions buried in cost-effectiveness estimates.