The repugnant conclusion does apply to animals, as long as you consider animals to be moral patients. (Will MacAskill does, which is illustrated in his previous book, Doing Good Better.)
If it were not possible to make humans happy on net, utilitarianism would also imply that it is worse for humanity to exist than not. But lots of people think is it possible to improve human life at scale.
Your post brings up two fundamental questions for me:
Are you a utilitarian? If you’re not, then it makes sense you wouldn’t agree with the implications of biting the bullet on the repugnant conclusion.
Is it possible to make the many wild animals of the world happy instead of suffering?
If that’s possible, it seems like we should do that. Then, the repugnant conclusion would apply—a world with many, somewhat happy animals would be better than a world with fewer, happier animals but less total utility.
If that’s not possible, then the repugnant conclusion does not apply. The goodness of the extinction of suffering animals is a different, odd implication of utilitarianism. Their extinction would probably also cause the extinction of humans (unless we cease to be animals ourselves and become digital, or we can somehow rely on a synthetic world). But given how many more wild animals there are than humans, the humans are probably morally outweighed by the animals, meaning eliminating the animals’ suffering is more morally important than preserving the happiness of the fewer humans.
Do you think we should try to make wild animals happy? How do you think we could make a plan to do that?
Is trying to change how wild animals go about their lives also steeped in colonialism? Does that make it worse than allowing wild animals to suffer?
I don’t understand your point about utilitarianism. Would you agree that its principles can be applied to wild animals as well as humans?
If human activity is increasing wild animal suffering (which I believe to be true), it follows that humans have the capacity to make wild animals happier by changing our behaviour. Encouraging the human population to level off or even decline would help wild animals. We can do this by educating girls, ending child marriage, giving business loans to women, and just generally giving women more power to control their own lives. Women who have control over their lives and procreation will often choose to have fewer children. This would be good for women as well as wild animals.
I think in general, the things we can do to make wild animals happier will also result in happier people, though in fewer numbers. Empowering women is one example. Ending the use of fossil fuels might be another, at least in my country of Canada. Whole forests have been cut down to “make” the tar sands, forests that once provided habitat for birds and other wild animals. The tar sands provide jobs, but they’re one of the most miserable jobs a person can do. The tar sands create greater unhappiness for both humans and wild animals.
Protecting wildlife areas and creating wildlife corridors would make wild animals happier. Since nature makes people happier, this again has the potential to make people happy as well.
“Is trying to change how wild animals go about their lives also steeped in colonialism?” you ask. We are already changing wild animals’ lives, without trying. We are interfering in their habitats, or taking their habitats away completely, in order to feed our capitalist machine. That’s colonialism: pushing residents off their land in order to use it for your own interests, without concern for their rights or welfare. Making amends for the damage done by colonialist activity is not in itself colonialism, it is reparation.
The repugnant conclusion does apply to animals, as long as you consider animals to be moral patients. (Will MacAskill does, which is illustrated in his previous book, Doing Good Better.)
If it were not possible to make humans happy on net, utilitarianism would also imply that it is worse for humanity to exist than not. But lots of people think is it possible to improve human life at scale.
Your post brings up two fundamental questions for me:
Are you a utilitarian? If you’re not, then it makes sense you wouldn’t agree with the implications of biting the bullet on the repugnant conclusion.
Is it possible to make the many wild animals of the world happy instead of suffering?
If that’s possible, it seems like we should do that. Then, the repugnant conclusion would apply—a world with many, somewhat happy animals would be better than a world with fewer, happier animals but less total utility.
If that’s not possible, then the repugnant conclusion does not apply. The goodness of the extinction of suffering animals is a different, odd implication of utilitarianism. Their extinction would probably also cause the extinction of humans (unless we cease to be animals ourselves and become digital, or we can somehow rely on a synthetic world). But given how many more wild animals there are than humans, the humans are probably morally outweighed by the animals, meaning eliminating the animals’ suffering is more morally important than preserving the happiness of the fewer humans.
Do you think we should try to make wild animals happy? How do you think we could make a plan to do that?
Is trying to change how wild animals go about their lives also steeped in colonialism? Does that make it worse than allowing wild animals to suffer?
I don’t understand your point about utilitarianism. Would you agree that its principles can be applied to wild animals as well as humans?
If human activity is increasing wild animal suffering (which I believe to be true), it follows that humans have the capacity to make wild animals happier by changing our behaviour. Encouraging the human population to level off or even decline would help wild animals. We can do this by educating girls, ending child marriage, giving business loans to women, and just generally giving women more power to control their own lives. Women who have control over their lives and procreation will often choose to have fewer children. This would be good for women as well as wild animals.
I think in general, the things we can do to make wild animals happier will also result in happier people, though in fewer numbers. Empowering women is one example. Ending the use of fossil fuels might be another, at least in my country of Canada. Whole forests have been cut down to “make” the tar sands, forests that once provided habitat for birds and other wild animals. The tar sands provide jobs, but they’re one of the most miserable jobs a person can do. The tar sands create greater unhappiness for both humans and wild animals.
Protecting wildlife areas and creating wildlife corridors would make wild animals happier. Since nature makes people happier, this again has the potential to make people happy as well.
“Is trying to change how wild animals go about their lives also steeped in colonialism?” you ask. We are already changing wild animals’ lives, without trying. We are interfering in their habitats, or taking their habitats away completely, in order to feed our capitalist machine. That’s colonialism: pushing residents off their land in order to use it for your own interests, without concern for their rights or welfare. Making amends for the damage done by colonialist activity is not in itself colonialism, it is reparation.
Thanks for commenting!