Kelsey Piper
Kelsey Piper | |
|---|---|
| Nationality (legal) | American |
| Occupation(s) | Journalist, blogger |
| Notable work | Future Perfect |
| Website | https://www.vox.com/future-perfect |
Kelsey Piper is an American journalist and effective altruist. She is a staff writer at Vox and the former president of Stanford Effective Altruism.[1]
Early life
Piper attended Stanford University, where she majored in computer science. At Stanford she discovered effective altruism, pledging to donate 30% of her lifetime income to charity and founding a campus advocacy organization.[2]
Future Perfect
Since 2018, Piper has written the Vox column Future Perfect, which covers "the most critical issues of the day through the lens of effective altruism".[3][4] Piper is concerned about global catastrophic risks, and treats journalism as a way to popularize these risks and advance the cause of addressing them,[5] which is part of effective altruism's broader concern regarding the relevance of immediate action.[6] Specifically, Piper has discussed the possibility that society is living on a historical precipice, where immediate action needs to be taken to avoid global catastrophic risks, and what implications that has for effective altruism and her own journalism.[6]
Piper is also an outspoken defender of billionaire philanthropy, including writing on how to assess where very-wealthy philanthropists should donate.[7] Others have questioned whether this is ethically dubious, both as a symptom of systematic issues with income inequality, and as potentially permitting the wealthy disproportionate influence over those issues they philanthropize.[8]
Piper was also an early responder to the COVID-19 pandemic, discussing the risk of a serious global pandemic in February[9] and recommending measures such as mask-wearing and social distancing in March.[10][11] Since then, she has discussed the societal risk posed by inaccurate study preprints[12] and analyzed the impact of the pandemic on the historical scale, deeming it one of the ten deadliest in human history.[13]
References
- ^ "Kelsey Piper". Vox (Profile). Retrieved February 2, 2021.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ Zabel, Claire (February 5, 2015). "A different take on giving back". Stanford Daily.
- ^ Labenz, Nathan; Piper, Kelsey (June 25, 2020). "Kelsey Piper: Future Perfect — a year of coverage". The Centre for Effective Altruism.
- ^ Schmidt, Christine (October 15, 2018). "Will Vox's new section on effective altruism…well, do any good?". Nieman Journalism Lab.
- ^ Wiblin, Robert; Harris, Keiran; Hutchinson, Michelle; Piper, Kelsey (February 27, 2019). Can journalists still write about important things? (Podcast). 80,000 Hours.
- ^ a b Fisher, Richard (September 24, 2020). "Are we living at the 'hinge of history'?". BBC Future.
- ^ Piper, Kelsey; Samuel, Sigal (January 13, 2021). "Dear Elon Musk: Here's how you should donate your money". Vox.
- ^ Campbell, David (June 6, 2019). "My students see giving money away as a good thing but they're getting leery of billionaire donors". The Conversation.
- ^ Masson, Gabrielle (February 6, 2020). "12th US coronavirus case confirmed in Wisconsin". Becker's Clinical Leadership and Infection Control.
- ^ Piper, Kelsey (March 13, 2020). "It's not overreacting to prepare for coronavirus. Here's how". Vox.
- ^ Miller, Johanna L. (July 17, 2020). "Patience". Physics Today.
- ^ Griggs, Mary Beth (September 19, 2020). "Why it's important to look for the limitations in coronavirus studies". The Verge.
- ^ Palmer, Ben (January 22, 2021). "Weekend reads: The travel industry steps in to help end Covid-19". Advisory Board.