It was pitched as the place where the world’s leading technologists, scientists and philosophers would gather to figure out how effective altruism and artificial intelligence could be combined to create a global force to eradicate poverty and improve everyone’s lives.
The Effective Ventures Foundation (EVF), which defines effective altruism as “using evidence and reason to figure out how to benefit others as much as possible”, decided £14.9m of its cash would be best spent buying Wytham Abbey, a 15th-century Grade-I listed manor house near Oxford.
