- Foundations (290)
- Effective Altruism (124)
- Existential risk (79)
- Future generations & longtermism (61)
- Moral philosophy (61)
- Moral patients (3)
- Moral uncertainty (1)
- Reasoning well (108)
- Decision making (34)
- Epistemics (2)
- Forecasting (2)
- World problems (302)
- Most pressing problems (216)
- Other pressing problems (99)
- Artificial sentience (1)
- Atomically precise manufacturing (2)
- Charter Cities (1)
- Civilisational resilience (3)
- Economic growth (3)
- Ending Ageing (1)
- Factory Farming (17)
- False ideas on social media (5)
- Global Health (17)
- Global public goods (1)
- Great power conflict (13)
- Gun Control (3)
- Harmful restrictions on migration (4)
- Improving values (1)
- Individual reasoning & cognition (12)
- Mental health (problem area) (1)
- Risks from malevolent actors (1)
- Risks of stable totalitarianism (4)
- S-risks (2)
- Science policy & infrastructure (13)
- Space governance (2)
- Voting reform (4)
- Whole brain emulation (1)
- Wild animal suffering (3)
- Problem prioritisation (20)
- Careers (450)
- Careers to build career capital (21)
- Categories of impactful careers (207)
- Other careers (135)
- Art & Entertainment (5)
- Biomedical Research (11)
- Computer Science PhD (12)
- Consulting (8)
- Data science (17)
- Design (2)
- Education (5)
- Finance (19)
- Lawyer (7)
- Marketing (2)
- Medicine (23)
- Doctor (12)
- Medical Researcher (6)
- Nursing (1)
- Philosophy academia (2)
- Politics (48)
- Civil Service (11)
- Party Politics (18)
- Web designer (1)
- Sometimes-recommended careers (185)
- Academic Research (86)
- China-Western coordination (4)
- Data collection for AI alignment (1)
- Earning to give in quant trading (6)
- Effective climate change interventions (5)
- Engineering (8)
- Expert in AI hardware (2)
- Found a tech startup (28)
- High impact executive assistant (3)
- Historian of large societal trends (2)
- Information security (5)
- Investigate new problems (1)
- Journalism (20)
- Journalist (6)
- Longtermist philanthropy (1)
- Non-technical roles in leading AI labs (2)
- Organise an effective altruism group (1)
- Policy careers (1)
- Public intellectual (5)
- Research management (7)
- Software Engineering (31)
- Specialist in emerging global powers (4)
- Think tank research (1)
- Top-recommended careers (178)
- AI safety technical research (33)
- Biorisk strategy & policy (27)
- Building the effective altruism community (19)
- China-related AI safety & governance (5)
- Forecasting research & implementation (14)
- Founder of new projects (34)
- Grantmaker (14)
- Long-term AI policy (28)
- Operations at high impact organisations (13)
- Research into global priorities (36)
- Career advice & strategy (277)
- Accidental harm (11)
- Advice for undergraduates (13)
- Being ambitious (13)
- Career capital (44)
- Career planning (25)
- Community & coordination (8)
- Exploration (19)
- Graduate school (18)
- PhDs (11)
- How to get a job (22)
- Leverage (6)
- Mental health (17)
- Now vs. Later (16)
- Personal fit (69)
- Ability (19)
- Job satisfaction (27)
- Risk (11)
- Unconventional advice (103)
- Fields (89)
- Computer science (16)
- Economics (26)
- History (7)
- Law (7)
- Machine learning (16)
- Philosophy (14)
- Physics (1)
- Psychology (7)
- Statistics (1)
- Other topics (193)
- About 80,000 Hours (66)
- Updates (43)
- Anonymous advice (18)
- COVID-19 (16)
- Doing good in your current job (90)
- Advocacy (28)
- Donating effectively (25)
- Income (31)
- Volunteering (7)
- User stories (4)
- About 80,000 Hours (66)
Topic archive: Existential risk
So long as civilisation continues to exist, we’ll have the chance to solve all our other problems, and have a far better future. But if we go extinct, that’s it.
Those concerned about extinction have started a new movement working to safeguard civilisation, which has been joined by Stephen Hawking, Max Tegmark, and new institutes founded by researchers at Cambridge, MIT, Oxford, and elsewhere.
Risks such as climate change and nuclear war are worrying enough — but there might be still bigger threats. We think that that reducing these risks could be the most important thing you do with your life, and want to explain exactly what you can do to help.
Selected highlights
The case for building expertise to work on US AI policy, and how to do it
Article by Niel Bowerman · Published January 2019 · Last updated December 2020
#33 – Oxford University’s Dr Anders Sandberg on if dictators could live forever, the annual risk of nuclear war, solar flares, and more.
Podcast by Robert Wiblin and Keiran Harris · Published May 29th, 2018
All content tagged "Existential risk"
2023
2022
- Problem profileProblem profileAugust
- Problem profileArticleJuly
- Problem profileJune
- PodcastPodcastThe case for reducing existential risks (Updated)ArticleMay
- Blog postAprilMarchFebruary
2021
DecemberNovember- PodcastOctober
- Career reviewJune
- PodcastPodcastMay
- PodcastMarch
2020
DecemberAugust- PodcastMay
- PodcastCareer guideAprilMarch
- Blog postProblem profilePodcastFebruary
- PodcastJanuary
2019
DecemberNovemberOctoberAugustJuneAprilMarch2018
DecemberOctober- PodcastAugust
- PodcastPodcastWhat are the most pressing world problems? (First published)ArticleJulyMay
- PodcastApril
2017
NovemberOctober- The case for reducing existential risks (First published)ArticleArticlePodcastSeptemberAugust
- Article
July- Is it fair to say that most social programmes don’t work? (First published)Article
March- Part 5: Which problems in the world are the most pressing to solve? (First published)Career guide
2016
April- Blog postJanuary
2015
December- Blog postApril
2014
OctoberJanuary- Blog postBlog post
2013
NovemberOctober- Blog post
August2012
February- Blog post
January