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The money that went into this endeavor was nothing compared to the compassion and outreach completely fed by the people of this city. All of the media and news you see is a result of grass roots movements, social media, and general kindness. Not some corporate sponsor.

My point is, this is hands down an act of kindness by an entire city. There isn't an evil plot behind it.

This makes me very happy, and it should make you happy too.

Intentions of kindness, sure. Grass roots movements, perhaps. But also more than a little wasteful. All of these things can be true at the same time.

I'm happy for the kid, but I wish a fraction of the human effort directed into this one sweeping act of altruism could be put to more productive ends.

A lot of people makes a lot of money on this heart warming story.

Just saying.

Here's a lens that might be helpful to view this through: seeing these kinds of personal, touching results encourages philanthropy--we're "spending money to make money," so to speak. We just need to channel that generated emotion and desire-to-help through the cold, calculating hands of organizations like GiveWell. :)

Another interpretation could be: "we did out part, we helped batkid. No need to donate/volunteer/etc"

There's a similar thing called in internet activism , where people who upvote/like and comment don't go and be really politically active, in a politically meaningful way.

I wonder whether seeing a story where something good happened that you didn't have a (rationalizable) part in, still triggers the effect. If it did, you'd think aid organizations would A/B-test call-ins to their telethons and realize that they should stop showing the happy kids that've already been helped.

Don't let yourself go down that road of thinking. If you judge every happiness done for others based on how many other people it could have helped, you will eventually suck all the joy out of every endeavor of yourself and others. Weighing souls will weigh down yours.

On a purely money note, Make-a-wish got a lot of publicity and goodwill which will help in other fund raising efforts so they can help even more people. It was an extremely good (and common) trade for a NGO. For example, the cost of holding an art show generally pays dividends in getting money to teach more artists. The "show" pays for a lot of "nuts & bolts".

Whenever I meet someone who asks for donations in the name of sick kids I politely refuse. I am always skeptical as to where that money actually goes. But when I read this report I am willing to donate more money to this organization.

The story is not just heartwarming it has served number of purposes. I got to know more about the disease, the organizations involved and most importantly it has motivated me to give money from my pocket to beat the real nemesis of that young batkid.

> But when I read this report I am willing to donate more money to this organization.

At the risk of being overly cynical, and putting words into mark_integerdsv's mouth, I believe that's almost exactly what he's arguing against. Make-a-wish spends $7.5k on each wish on average[1]. Whereas something like Schistosomiasis Control Initiative per-child cost is $5[2]. That is, the money spent "granting wishes" could perform much more good elsewhere, and so by donating to Make-a-Wish one is buying "fuzzies"[3], not being optimally philanthropic.

[1]: http://wish.org/content/faq#How-much-does-granting-a-wish-co...

[2]: http://www.givewell.org/international/top-charities/schistos... , the $5 figure comes from http://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities

[3]: Word adopted from http://lesswrong.com/lw/6z/purchase_fuzzies_and_utilons_sepa... , meaning "warm fuzzy feelings of 'doing good'"

GiveWell estimate the cost per life saved for the Schistosomiasis Control Initiative to be around $1700-$3800, while the $7,500 that Make-a-wish spends per child, while a wonderful gesture, does not actually save their life.

True, it's not optimal. But, it's important to keep in mind that this is not a zero-sum game. The $7500 is not being diverted or even distracted from more efficient uses. It's money that in all likelihood would have never been donated to other uses.

We need a lot more of both ends of this spectrum. More warm fuzzies to get people's attention -at all. And, more awareness of the wildly different efficiencies of different philanthropic strategies. Achieving both attention and efficiency is really hard. If you figure out how to do that, let me know. In the mean time, we should be happy for whatever wins we can get.

I do not think the said organization is working in the area of "Schistosomiasis Control Initiative". They are working in a different area and it is good thing that they have money to spend. May be it is much easier to ask for money for leukemia than for "Schistosomiasis Control Initiative".

I dont think the said organization is optimizing for overall child health care. They are optimizing it for a particular area.

Judging an act by its consequences seems like a frightfully hard-nosed, rational thing to do; the problem with trying to put it into practice is that we tend to end up judging only by the superficially obvious consequences and ignoring the more important long-term effects.

It's easy to compare the nominal cost of this event with the idea that it only helped one person, but the latter isn't actually true; it obviously brightened the lives of thousands of people, and not just with shallow entertainment but with the opportunity to lift their gazes from the mud and look at the sky, to reflect for a moment on their place in the world. I have no idea how to calculate the benefit from that, but it wouldn't surprise me if it greatly outweighed the cost.

As you say, truckloads of aid money has been pouring into Africa for decades, and not only has it not produced the promised results, it has been argued by people familiar with what actually happens there that it does more harm than good: http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/spiegel-intervie...

By contrast, smartphones are connecting Africa to modern civilization, and that's something that might actually make a positive difference. There is after all no intrinsic reason Africans can't provide food and water and medicine for themselves just as people do in Europe and America and large parts of what used to be the Third World. What's missing is knowhow and organization. A truckload of money dumped into projects that feel good to rich Westerners won't provide those things. Putting the knowledge of humanity at the fingertips of individual Africans just might.

And yet those phones weren't paid for by charity, because the people running charities are mortal and fallible; they just can't see that far ahead. The phones were paid for primarily by rich Westerners buying them as toys.

The world is more complex than any of us can know. Enjoy your toys with a clear conscience.

While I totally agree with most of the sentiments you have expressed I do need to point out one issue I have with your comment:

>There is after all no intrinsic reason Africans can't provide food and water and medicine for themselves just as people do in Europe and America and large parts of what used to be the Third World. What's missing is knowhow and organization.

This comment is totally ignorant of the scale of the problems faced in the third world.

Ridding ourselves of corruption and getting together a solid plan still leaves us with massive problems to fix. Truly, MASSIVE problems.

It is the scale that requires capital and make no mistake that the first world has no small amount of complicity in the current state of the rest of our world.

I agree with you that money isn't going to solve it all.

Throwing money at it is largely a case of too little too late.

>> it obviously brightened the lives of thousands of people, and not just with shallow entertainment but with the opportunity to lift their gazes from the mud and look at the sky, to reflect for a moment on their place in the world. I have no idea how to calculate the benefit from that, but it wouldn't surprise me if it greatly outweighed the cost.

But we don't know if it had a positive effect. Maybe it had a negative effect? Maybe people will donate and volunteer less to other causes ? Maybe we are replacing valuable charity with fun charity ? Those are all valid options.

And because this affected so many people , the cumulative effect would be a big negative ?

It's hard to fully predict the result of our actions. Life is complex as you say.But that's beside the point.

The point is: thousands of people having a good time, while believing they did something great, while doing very little in reality.

I got a bit of a dust mote in my eye while reading this and had to step outside of the workroom for a short break.