But we should probably take care about ourselves first and make the world robustly good for humans. I wouldnāt feel particularly good about myself letting kids die due to concerns for insects or even chicken.
Do you think there should still be some spending on animal welfare? Each 4 k$ or so spent on animal welfare could have saved one child if donated to GiveWellās top charities.
The ill dog can even have some real fun in last days with morphine or other drugs (Iām not jokingā¦ opioids cause euphoria and pleasure to everyone)
Interesting perspective.
Maybe youāre right if weāre strictly thinking on margin. In this case you can say, on margin, for me itās best to help arthropods. And it might indeed be the case. In your particular case you have this kind of luck that your visceral care is so well aligned with utilitarian calculus. So you can help arthropods and feel great about it.
Yes, I am thinking at the margin. I believe soil animals are very neglected in the current portfolio of animal welfare interventions. The animal advocacy movement spent around 259 M$ in 2024. The vast majority was spent on farmed animals, and almost nothing on soil animals. I am only aware of2 projects on soil invertebrates funded by WAI on spiders totalling 56.9 k$ (= (29.9 + 27.0)*10^3). If one of these happened in 2024, spending on research on soil invertebrates was 0.0110 % (= 56.9*10^3/ā2/ā(259*10^6)) of that targeting farmed animals. In contrast, I estimate there are 959 M times as many soil animals as farmed animals, and that soil animals have 13.6 k times as many neurons in total as farmed animals. The ratio between total number of neurons and spending is 124 M (= 13.6*10^3/ā(1.10*10^-4)) times as large for soil animals as for farmed animals. I am very uncertain about whether the total number of neurons is a good proxy for potential benefits, but I see it as a reasonable option.
Do you think there should still be some spending on animal welfare? Each 4 k$ or so spent on animal welfare could have saved one child if donated to GiveWellās top charities.
I am a bit conflicted about it, but I think YES, we should spend some on animal welfare, but not all of our donation money.
My intuition is to take the word āphilanthropyā and understand it literally. If you want to call yourself philanthropist you must be helping peopleā¦ Because it literally means ālove of peopleā.
Also if you asked most world religions what they mean by charity, I guess in most of the cases they would tell you āhelping the poorā and āhelping peopleā in general.
If we stop doing it, I think weāre making a mistake.
So I think a non-negotiable part of our donation budget should go to human charities. And the rest of it, we can spend freely on other causes, like X risk prevention and animal welfare, including arthropods.
X risk prevention seems to be especially good, as it could help both humans and animals at the same time.
P.S.
Could you recommend any charity directly concerned with soil animals and arthropods that you think is good and that you yourself donate to? Iād like to know, perhaps I could donate some.
Also Iām wondering if they do just research at this phase, or are they already actively helping?
Could you recommend any charity directly concerned with soil animals and arthropods that you think is good and that you yourself donate to? Iād like to know, perhaps I could donate some.
Also Iām wondering if they do just research at this phase, or are they already actively helping?
I am glad you are open to supporting work targeting invertebrates. My top recommendation for this is funding the Arthropoda Foundation. I donated a few k$ to them last year. Here is the post announcing their launch, and here is their post during the last Marginal Funding Week. They have been funding research informing how to increase the welfare of farmed arthropods, and āare particularly interested in research with a clear path to impact, whether by shaping future science or informing real-world decision-makingā.
Do you think there should still be some spending on animal welfare? Each 4 k$ or so spent on animal welfare could have saved one child if donated to GiveWellās top charities.
Interesting perspective.
Yes, I am thinking at the margin. I believe soil animals are very neglected in the current portfolio of animal welfare interventions. The animal advocacy movement spent around 259 M$ in 2024. The vast majority was spent on farmed animals, and almost nothing on soil animals. I am only aware of 2 projects on soil invertebrates funded by WAI on spiders totalling 56.9 k$ (= (29.9 + 27.0)*10^3). If one of these happened in 2024, spending on research on soil invertebrates was 0.0110 % (= 56.9*10^3/ā2/ā(259*10^6)) of that targeting farmed animals. In contrast, I estimate there are 959 M times as many soil animals as farmed animals, and that soil animals have 13.6 k times as many neurons in total as farmed animals. The ratio between total number of neurons and spending is 124 M (= 13.6*10^3/ā(1.10*10^-4)) times as large for soil animals as for farmed animals. I am very uncertain about whether the total number of neurons is a good proxy for potential benefits, but I see it as a reasonable option.
I am a bit conflicted about it, but I think YES, we should spend some on animal welfare, but not all of our donation money.
My intuition is to take the word āphilanthropyā and understand it literally. If you want to call yourself philanthropist you must be helping peopleā¦ Because it literally means ālove of peopleā.
Also if you asked most world religions what they mean by charity, I guess in most of the cases they would tell you āhelping the poorā and āhelping peopleā in general.
If we stop doing it, I think weāre making a mistake.
So I think a non-negotiable part of our donation budget should go to human charities. And the rest of it, we can spend freely on other causes, like X risk prevention and animal welfare, including arthropods.
X risk prevention seems to be especially good, as it could help both humans and animals at the same time.
P.S.
Could you recommend any charity directly concerned with soil animals and arthropods that you think is good and that you yourself donate to? Iād like to know, perhaps I could donate some.
Also Iām wondering if they do just research at this phase, or are they already actively helping?
I am glad you are open to supporting work targeting invertebrates. My top recommendation for this is funding the Arthropoda Foundation. I donated a few k$ to them last year. Here is the post announcing their launch, and here is their post during the last Marginal Funding Week. They have been funding research informing how to increase the welfare of farmed arthropods, and āare particularly interested in research with a clear path to impact, whether by shaping future science or informing real-world decision-makingā.
OK, thank you Vasco, both for conversation and for recommendation.
I hope they do some good work and achieve something for arthropods.
Thank you too for making me understand your perspective better. I think it is shared by many people.