Thanks so much for this thoughtful post, Vasco! It is so heartening to see people taking arthropod welfare seriously.
While I agree that chicken welfare reforms could plausibly harm arthropods more than they help chickens, I donāt think that means we shouldnāt support chicken welfare reforms. For the same reason I reject the meat-eater problem, the logic of the larder, and the logic of the logger, I think that to get to a society that maximizes utility over the long term, we will probably need to take some steps that decrease utility in the short term.
That is, I donāt know exactly what global-scale arthropod welfare programs would look like, but I think weāre more likely to get there if more people live in material abundance, so I think economic development is worthwhile even if it increases factory farming in the short term. I think reforming, regulating, and banning factory farming are also very likely to be helpful (and possibly necessary) for human society to normalize and institutionalize concern for non-human animals, and to invest substantial resources in helping them.
I realize this is a suspiciously convenient conclusion to come to, and I canāt rule out the possibility that my position is driven by motivated reasoning. But I think itās a good sign that my claim (āChicken welfare reforms might be good overall, even if they hurt arthropods in the short termā) uses a similar logic to yours (āChicken welfare reforms might be bad overall, even if they help chickens directlyā). Both are examples of finding a different conclusion as a result of changing the scope of the analysis: Should our calculations include just chickens directly affected, or also arthropods indirectly affected, or also farmed and wild animals very-indirectly affected?
Of course one could agree with me that we should include the very-indirectly-affected animals, but disagree with my guesses about what would be best for them. One of the biggest weaknesses of my approach is that itās much harder to judge what kinds of are worthwhile, or to compare effectiveness across efforts. It also takes things further from ecology and more into social movement theory, which is annoying because I enjoy the former a lot more than the latter.
But that doesnāt mean we should abandon empiricism and settle for hand-waviness in everything. Analyses like yours can be very useful; I just think we should interpret their results in the context of explicit theories of change about long-term effects.
That is, I donāt know exactly what global-scale arthropod welfare programs would look like, but I think weāre more likely to get there if more people live in material abundance, so I think economic development is worthwhile even if it increases factory farming in the short term.
I tend to agree. Among 53 countries I analysed, there is a U-shaped relationship between the fraction of commercial egg production coming from cage-free hens, and the logarithm of the real gross domestic product (real GDP) per capita, which weakly suggests economic growth leads to improvements in the conditions of farmed animals.
However, I guess the beneficial longterm effects of economic growth on wild arthropods are not sufficiently large to dominate the neaterm effects. I estimated a spending on wild animal welfare in 2023 of 5.02 M 2023-$, 2.70*10^-8 (= 5.02*10^6/ā(166*10^12*1.12)) of the real GDP in 2023. So my prior is that one has to increase real GDP by 37.0 M 2023-$ (= 1/ā(2.70*10^-8)) to increase spending on wild animal welfare by 1 2023-$. In other words, the direct effect of increasing economic growth on wild animal welfare is super small. So I remain uncertain about whether it is beneficial or harmful.
I think reforming, regulating, and banning factory farming are also very likely to be helpful (and possibly necessary) for human society to normalize and institutionalize concern for non-human animals, and to invest substantial resources in helping them.
I worry adocating for animal rights may be harmful due to encouraging the wilderness preservation (regardless of whether wild animals have positive or negative lives), and I think it is difficult to advocate for banning factory-farming without relying on animal rights. From a welfarist perspective, and ignoring effects on wild animals, lots of factory-farmed animals with positive lives would be much better than no farmed animals.
Of course one could agree with me that we should include the very-indirectly-affected animals, but disagree with my guesses about what would be best for them. One of the biggest weaknesses of my approach is that itās much harder to judge what kinds of are worthwhile, or to compare effectiveness across efforts. It also takes things further from ecology and more into social movement theory, which is annoying because I enjoy the former a lot more than the latter.
But that doesnāt mean we should abandon empiricism and settle for hand-waviness in everything. Analyses like yours can be very useful; I just think we should interpret their results in the context of explicit theories of change about long-term effects.
I very much agree one should in principle account for all effects. However, I am not aware of organisations mainly targeting farmed vertebrates or humans whose theories of change (TOCs) include effects on invertebrates. So I have little confidence about whether they are beneficial or harmful to wild invertebrates. I agree empirically-based explicit TOCs about effects on intertebrates would be useful.
My personal best guess is that wild arthropods have positive lives, and that broiler welfare and cage-free reforms decrease the welfare of arthropods 47.7 and 4.66 times as much as they increase the welfare of hens (as I estimate broiler welfare and cage-free campaigns decrease 1.95 M and 452 k arthropod-years per $). So I estimate broiler welfare and cage-free campaigns have a cost-effectiveness of ā78.0 (= (1 ā 47.7)*1.67) and ā16.8 QALY/ā$ (= (1 ā 4.66)*4.59), which, for my guesses of pain intensities, are equivalent to causing 7.80 (= 78.0/ā10) and 1.68 (= 16.8/ā10) hours of disabling pain in humans per $. I agree there is lots of uncertainty, but I think funding interventions which can be hugely harmful depending on how it resolves is not a good way of dealing with it. Funding organisations working on invertebrate welfare like the ones I mention in the post seems much more robustly positive, and also more cost-effective than vertebrate welfare interventions changing feed production even ignoring the effects of this on non-target animals.
Thanks so much for this thoughtful post, Vasco! It is so heartening to see people taking arthropod welfare seriously.
While I agree that chicken welfare reforms could plausibly harm arthropods more than they help chickens, I donāt think that means we shouldnāt support chicken welfare reforms. For the same reason I reject the meat-eater problem, the logic of the larder, and the logic of the logger, I think that to get to a society that maximizes utility over the long term, we will probably need to take some steps that decrease utility in the short term.
That is, I donāt know exactly what global-scale arthropod welfare programs would look like, but I think weāre more likely to get there if more people live in material abundance, so I think economic development is worthwhile even if it increases factory farming in the short term. I think reforming, regulating, and banning factory farming are also very likely to be helpful (and possibly necessary) for human society to normalize and institutionalize concern for non-human animals, and to invest substantial resources in helping them.
I realize this is a suspiciously convenient conclusion to come to, and I canāt rule out the possibility that my position is driven by motivated reasoning. But I think itās a good sign that my claim (āChicken welfare reforms might be good overall, even if they hurt arthropods in the short termā) uses a similar logic to yours (āChicken welfare reforms might be bad overall, even if they help chickens directlyā). Both are examples of finding a different conclusion as a result of changing the scope of the analysis: Should our calculations include just chickens directly affected, or also arthropods indirectly affected, or also farmed and wild animals very-indirectly affected?
Of course one could agree with me that we should include the very-indirectly-affected animals, but disagree with my guesses about what would be best for them. One of the biggest weaknesses of my approach is that itās much harder to judge what kinds of are worthwhile, or to compare effectiveness across efforts. It also takes things further from ecology and more into social movement theory, which is annoying because I enjoy the former a lot more than the latter.
But that doesnāt mean we should abandon empiricism and settle for hand-waviness in everything. Analyses like yours can be very useful; I just think we should interpret their results in the context of explicit theories of change about long-term effects.
Thanks for the comment, Cam!
I tend to agree. Among 53 countries I analysed, there is a U-shaped relationship between the fraction of commercial egg production coming from cage-free hens, and the logarithm of the real gross domestic product (real GDP) per capita, which weakly suggests economic growth leads to improvements in the conditions of farmed animals.
However, I guess the beneficial longterm effects of economic growth on wild arthropods are not sufficiently large to dominate the neaterm effects. I estimated a spending on wild animal welfare in 2023 of 5.02 M 2023-$, 2.70*10^-8 (= 5.02*10^6/ā(166*10^12*1.12)) of the real GDP in 2023. So my prior is that one has to increase real GDP by 37.0 M 2023-$ (= 1/ā(2.70*10^-8)) to increase spending on wild animal welfare by 1 2023-$. In other words, the direct effect of increasing economic growth on wild animal welfare is super small. So I remain uncertain about whether it is beneficial or harmful.
I worry adocating for animal rights may be harmful due to encouraging the wilderness preservation (regardless of whether wild animals have positive or negative lives), and I think it is difficult to advocate for banning factory-farming without relying on animal rights. From a welfarist perspective, and ignoring effects on wild animals, lots of factory-farmed animals with positive lives would be much better than no farmed animals.
I very much agree one should in principle account for all effects. However, I am not aware of organisations mainly targeting farmed vertebrates or humans whose theories of change (TOCs) include effects on invertebrates. So I have little confidence about whether they are beneficial or harmful to wild invertebrates. I agree empirically-based explicit TOCs about effects on intertebrates would be useful.
My personal best guess is that wild arthropods have positive lives, and that broiler welfare and cage-free reforms decrease the welfare of arthropods 47.7 and 4.66 times as much as they increase the welfare of hens (as I estimate broiler welfare and cage-free campaigns decrease 1.95 M and 452 k arthropod-years per $). So I estimate broiler welfare and cage-free campaigns have a cost-effectiveness of ā78.0 (= (1 ā 47.7)*1.67) and ā16.8 QALY/ā$ (= (1 ā 4.66)*4.59), which, for my guesses of pain intensities, are equivalent to causing 7.80 (= 78.0/ā10) and 1.68 (= 16.8/ā10) hours of disabling pain in humans per $. I agree there is lots of uncertainty, but I think funding interventions which can be hugely harmful depending on how it resolves is not a good way of dealing with it. Funding organisations working on invertebrate welfare like the ones I mention in the post seems much more robustly positive, and also more cost-effective than vertebrate welfare interventions changing feed production even ignoring the effects of this on non-target animals.