I think a lot of people’s moral reasoning about animals is posthoc/based on cognitive dissonance. That is, people like eating meat, or it’s a valuable part of their culture, and their moral intuitions around animal exploitation are built around that. So it seems plausible to me that moral advocacy efforts become substantially more effective if we’re able to quickly replace one of the biggest uses of animals.
Tobias also mentioned this. I am adding this to the counterargument. I wasn’t convinced enough when Tobias mentioned it. But your mention of the 80% (or other points that can count as near success) point is relevant here. It seems hopeful that we can replace 80% of FFFF, and reduce people’s cognitive dissonance from there.
I feel like this is just intractable. Meat has the advantage of being embedded in culture and identity for generations. Without proposing any alternative, and going entirely through the moral route, means going up against this generational idea that eating meat is okay. Success seems hard. I’m wary of taking such a risk, when there’s also the possibility of factory farming for food persisting into the future (and I’d guess, in business-as-usual scenarios, it remains a bigger problem than other kinds of factory farming). I will also say I’m not convinced that expanding our moral circle to animals helps expand our moral circle to things like digital minds in the far future, though that’s a conversation for another day.
I agree that without any alternatives the change is hard even for hardcore moral changers, that’s a great point and a great reminder.
I’m not sure I’m compelled by the mechanism for lock-in.
Me neither, I am literally throwing my intuitions to be critiqued, hopefully bringing out, or rejecting, a potential crucial consideration.
So in the case of horses, for example, I don’t think it was easier to convince people that horses matter before they were replaced as practical transport.
I agree with this. But my point in the post was that by losing the opportunity to slowly do the horse advocacy, it was kind of a lock-in. And I intuitively think that it is plausible that if automobiles were invented later, and horse advocacy was given time to succeed, maybe factory farming won’t be born.
And it’s relevant to the 80% point. There was virtually no such point for the horses. It happened so quick that the horse advocates have no time to do “posthoc advocacy”.
I’m uncomfortable about this argument for nonconsequentialist reasons. If factory farming is a grave injustice that ought be abolished (even if you’re a consequentialist who buys moral uncertainty), it seems like letting it stay for much longer and taking a huge risk that it stays forever because you want to do it for the right reasons could be a massive negligent injustice in itself. It feels like, in a moral way, saying “it’s bad to hire more beat cops to deter crime, because deterring crime through fear doesn’t convince anyone that their crime is wrong.” One reason a lot of people would find that intuitively bad is because it feels like it’s instrumentalizing the victims of crime for a dubious future consequence.
Interesting. I think I am nudged a bit by your point. (I endorse moral uncertainty).
Tobias also mentioned this. I am adding this to the counterargument. I wasn’t convinced enough when Tobias mentioned it. But your mention of the 80% (or other points that can count as near success) point is relevant here. It seems hopeful that we can replace 80% of FFFF, and reduce people’s cognitive dissonance from there.
I agree that without any alternatives the change is hard even for hardcore moral changers, that’s a great point and a great reminder.
Me neither, I am literally throwing my intuitions to be critiqued, hopefully bringing out, or rejecting, a potential crucial consideration.
I agree with this. But my point in the post was that by losing the opportunity to slowly do the horse advocacy, it was kind of a lock-in. And I intuitively think that it is plausible that if automobiles were invented later, and horse advocacy was given time to succeed, maybe factory farming won’t be born.
And it’s relevant to the 80% point. There was virtually no such point for the horses. It happened so quick that the horse advocates have no time to do “posthoc advocacy”.
Interesting. I think I am nudged a bit by your point. (I endorse moral uncertainty).