This seems to me like a Pascal’s mugging. Much has been written about why we should not concede to such. To me, it is enough to see that history has not been kind to those who, when faced with a speculative moral analysis in conflict with human values, chose the analysis.
To ask that others prioritize the well-being of nematodes over that of clearly sentient animals (including humans), I’d need far greater confidence in the ability for these small beings to suffer. To prioritize reducing their populations, I believe we need much more confidence that their lives are net negative, and that downstream effects could be avoided. (Even with those considerations, I think there’s still some moral uncertainty. Beings with net-negative welfare can still want to live, and their lives have value in non-utilitarian moral perspectives.)
Much has been written about why we should not concede to such.
I’ve seen much written that takes it as a premise that you shouldn’t concede to a Pascal’s mugging, but I’ve seen very little about why not.
(I can think of arguments for not conceding in the actual Pascal’s mugging thought experiment: (1) ignoring threats as a game-theoretic strategy and (2) threats of unlikely outcomes constituting evidence against the outcome. Neither of these apply to caring about soil nematodes.)
I’ve seen much written that takes it as a premise that you shouldn’t concede to a Pascal’s mugging, but I’ve seen very little about why not.
You may be right. I think a lot of us feel that it is intuitively wrong and take that as a premise.
I don’t have a rigorous argument against biting the bullet of expected value in the abstract. But in my view, utility calculations will never fully account for 2nd order harms (let alone alternative moral perspectives), and I think that provides ample reason to not rely on numbers alone and err on the side of caution.
Specific risks that come to mind for me here (at least, in the unlikely scenario where the nematode-extinction movement enters the EA mainstream) risks that come to mind for me are reputational damage, intra-movement conflict, climate change exacerbation, biodiversity loss, and the possibility of redirecting evolution toward greater suffering. I’m sure there’s plenty of other risks I haven’t considered.
I’m all for caring about soil nematodes and researching their welfare! I just think we need more clarity to justify shifting unrelated charity spending.
Thanks, Ailanthus. I would say my recommendation of supporting GiveWell’s funds is very much in agreement with human values. In which sense do you think there is a conflict?
I would agree that supporting GiveWell (or HIPF) is in alignment with human values.
But if I understand your analysis correctly, you find the vast majority (> 99.9%) of the benefit of giving to these charities is received not by humans, but by soil life (specifically, mostly by nonexistent nematodes that would have existed counter-factually).
All is well so long as human impact and soil life impact are closely correlated, but I see no reason why that must always be the case. I suspect there are interventions that could produce event greater results by convert even more wildlands to cropland, but with no benefits to humans. It’s these interventions that come into conflict with my values.
Specifically, I find it morally dubious to purchase animal products with the intention of reducing nematode populations. More broadly, I’m doubtful that speculative, uncertain benefits (even if possibly immense) can justify clear harm. I think this useful moral intuition, given the complexity of 2nd order effects and human tendencies toward motivated reasoning.
Similarly, I also find the idea that destruction of wildlands and their creatures is good to be in tension with my intuitive values. While I wish a positive life for all sentient animals, I also value the existence of wild habitats. If indeed most wild beings have negative lives, these values are in conflict. Nonetheless, I feel that they come from largely overlapping drives, and I expect this is true for most who care about animals. Considering the controversy surrounding killing animals even with very good reasons (e.g. invasive species control) I think a message of “Expand your moral circle to include these creatures… then kill millions of them!” is unlikely to land well.
Along more preference-utilitarian lines, I have a hard time imagining the nematodes getting on board with this. If an superintelligent AI finds that human existence is probably net-negative, does that entitle them to eradicate us?
I could also imagine cases where human welfare and nematode welfare could be actively in conflict. For instance, if one had an opportunity to increase human population more rapidly by installing an authoritarian government.
I’m curious about how you navigate these issues in cases where they’re not so obviously aligned. Would you support charities with no other benefits if you found greater impact on soil life? How would you trade off harms to humans and other animals?
Yes, I estimated over 99.9 % of the benefits of donating to GiveWell’s top charities come from reducing the number of soil animals.
I would say buying animal-based foods is in agreement with human values in the sense of increasing the welfare of both consumers and animals.
I would be surprised if there are cost-effective ways of advocating for decreasing agricultural land which decrease human welfare. The cost-effectiveness of advocating for an intervention is the cost-effectiveness of the intervention times the money moved to it as a fraction of the spending on advocating it, and this fundraising multiplier will tend to be much lower for advocy for supporting interventions which decrease human welfare.
I doubt that total human welfare is negative. I estimated only 6.37 % of people have negative lives. However, even if total human welfare was negative, I do not think it would make sense for superintelligent AI to kill all humans:
I guess making human welfare positive would be not only more beneficial, but also cheaper, thus increasing human welfare more cost-effectively.
Even if killing all humans was the most cost-effective way of increasing human welfare, I believe the overall effect of this would be driven by effects on soil nematodes, mites, and springtails, and that these would be harmed as a result of the decrease in agricultural-land-years caused by the extinction of humans.
I think increasing human-years via decreasing human mortality is generally more cost-effective than through increasing human fertility. GiveWell’s top charities save a life for around 5 k$, 10 % of the lowest cost per additional birth of 50 k$ I found with a quick search.
I think effects on humans are smaller than those on soil animals, so I would focus on these whenever there are conflicts, but I am sceptical about finding cost-effective ways of helping soil animals that significantly harm humans.
This seems to me like a Pascal’s mugging. Much has been written about why we should not concede to such. To me, it is enough to see that history has not been kind to those who, when faced with a speculative moral analysis in conflict with human values, chose the analysis.
To ask that others prioritize the well-being of nematodes over that of clearly sentient animals (including humans), I’d need far greater confidence in the ability for these small beings to suffer. To prioritize reducing their populations, I believe we need much more confidence that their lives are net negative, and that downstream effects could be avoided. (Even with those considerations, I think there’s still some moral uncertainty. Beings with net-negative welfare can still want to live, and their lives have value in non-utilitarian moral perspectives.)
I’ve seen much written that takes it as a premise that you shouldn’t concede to a Pascal’s mugging, but I’ve seen very little about why not.
(I can think of arguments for not conceding in the actual Pascal’s mugging thought experiment: (1) ignoring threats as a game-theoretic strategy and (2) threats of unlikely outcomes constituting evidence against the outcome. Neither of these apply to caring about soil nematodes.)
You may be right. I think a lot of us feel that it is intuitively wrong and take that as a premise.
I don’t have a rigorous argument against biting the bullet of expected value in the abstract. But in my view, utility calculations will never fully account for 2nd order harms (let alone alternative moral perspectives), and I think that provides ample reason to not rely on numbers alone and err on the side of caution.
Specific risks that come to mind for me here (at least, in the unlikely scenario where the nematode-extinction movement enters the EA mainstream) risks that come to mind for me are reputational damage, intra-movement conflict, climate change exacerbation, biodiversity loss, and the possibility of redirecting evolution toward greater suffering. I’m sure there’s plenty of other risks I haven’t considered.
I’m all for caring about soil nematodes and researching their welfare! I just think we need more clarity to justify shifting unrelated charity spending.
Thanks, Ailanthus. I would say my recommendation of supporting GiveWell’s funds is very much in agreement with human values. In which sense do you think there is a conflict?
Thanks, Vasco.
I would agree that supporting GiveWell (or HIPF) is in alignment with human values.
But if I understand your analysis correctly, you find the vast majority (> 99.9%) of the benefit of giving to these charities is received not by humans, but by soil life (specifically, mostly by nonexistent nematodes that would have existed counter-factually).
All is well so long as human impact and soil life impact are closely correlated, but I see no reason why that must always be the case. I suspect there are interventions that could produce event greater results by convert even more wildlands to cropland, but with no benefits to humans. It’s these interventions that come into conflict with my values.
Specifically, I find it morally dubious to purchase animal products with the intention of reducing nematode populations. More broadly, I’m doubtful that speculative, uncertain benefits (even if possibly immense) can justify clear harm. I think this useful moral intuition, given the complexity of 2nd order effects and human tendencies toward motivated reasoning.
Similarly, I also find the idea that destruction of wildlands and their creatures is good to be in tension with my intuitive values. While I wish a positive life for all sentient animals, I also value the existence of wild habitats. If indeed most wild beings have negative lives, these values are in conflict. Nonetheless, I feel that they come from largely overlapping drives, and I expect this is true for most who care about animals. Considering the controversy surrounding killing animals even with very good reasons (e.g. invasive species control) I think a message of “Expand your moral circle to include these creatures… then kill millions of them!” is unlikely to land well.
Along more preference-utilitarian lines, I have a hard time imagining the nematodes getting on board with this. If an superintelligent AI finds that human existence is probably net-negative, does that entitle them to eradicate us?
I could also imagine cases where human welfare and nematode welfare could be actively in conflict. For instance, if one had an opportunity to increase human population more rapidly by installing an authoritarian government.
I’m curious about how you navigate these issues in cases where they’re not so obviously aligned. Would you support charities with no other benefits if you found greater impact on soil life? How would you trade off harms to humans and other animals?
Yes, I estimated over 99.9 % of the benefits of donating to GiveWell’s top charities come from reducing the number of soil animals.
I would say buying animal-based foods is in agreement with human values in the sense of increasing the welfare of both consumers and animals.
I would be surprised if there are cost-effective ways of advocating for decreasing agricultural land which decrease human welfare. The cost-effectiveness of advocating for an intervention is the cost-effectiveness of the intervention times the money moved to it as a fraction of the spending on advocating it, and this fundraising multiplier will tend to be much lower for advocy for supporting interventions which decrease human welfare.
I doubt that total human welfare is negative. I estimated only 6.37 % of people have negative lives. However, even if total human welfare was negative, I do not think it would make sense for superintelligent AI to kill all humans:
I guess making human welfare positive would be not only more beneficial, but also cheaper, thus increasing human welfare more cost-effectively.
Even if killing all humans was the most cost-effective way of increasing human welfare, I believe the overall effect of this would be driven by effects on soil nematodes, mites, and springtails, and that these would be harmed as a result of the decrease in agricultural-land-years caused by the extinction of humans.
I think increasing human-years via decreasing human mortality is generally more cost-effective than through increasing human fertility. GiveWell’s top charities save a life for around 5 k$, 10 % of the lowest cost per additional birth of 50 k$ I found with a quick search.
I think effects on humans are smaller than those on soil animals, so I would focus on these whenever there are conflicts, but I am sceptical about finding cost-effective ways of helping soil animals that significantly harm humans.