I think the opportunity for impact for wild animal welfare is way bigger, and it’s much more “normal”
I agree the absolute value of the total welfare of wild animals is much larger than that of farmed animals. On the other hand, the most popular opportunities to help wild animals focus on ones which only account for a small fraction of the total welfare of wild animals (although I think they change the welfare of soil animals much more). In extreme cases, such opportunitites would only improve the welfare of a few wild mammals to avoid the extinction of species. Of course, this is not the target of the Center for Wild Animal Welfare (CWAW), or Wild Animal Initiative (WAI). However, I still wonder about whether CWAW and WAI are focussing too much on what is popular, and underfunding research informing how to increase the welfare of (wild) soil animals. I currently think funding the Arthropoda Foundation is the best option for this. Mal Graham, who together with Bob Fischer “make[s] most of the strategic and granting decisions for Arthropoda”, mentioned “We collaborate with Wild Animal Initiative (I’m the strategy director at WAI) to reduce duplication of effort, and have a slightly better public profile for running soil invertebrate studies, so we expect it will generally be Arthropoda rather than WAI who would be more likely to run this kind of program”.
Hi Abraham.
I agree the absolute value of the total welfare of wild animals is much larger than that of farmed animals. On the other hand, the most popular opportunities to help wild animals focus on ones which only account for a small fraction of the total welfare of wild animals (although I think they change the welfare of soil animals much more). In extreme cases, such opportunitites would only improve the welfare of a few wild mammals to avoid the extinction of species. Of course, this is not the target of the Center for Wild Animal Welfare (CWAW), or Wild Animal Initiative (WAI). However, I still wonder about whether CWAW and WAI are focussing too much on what is popular, and underfunding research informing how to increase the welfare of (wild) soil animals. I currently think funding the Arthropoda Foundation is the best option for this. Mal Graham, who together with Bob Fischer “make[s] most of the strategic and granting decisions for Arthropoda”, mentioned “We collaborate with Wild Animal Initiative (I’m the strategy director at WAI) to reduce duplication of effort, and have a slightly better public profile for running soil invertebrate studies, so we expect it will generally be Arthropoda rather than WAI who would be more likely to run this kind of program”.