In many cases, it seems very doubtful whether further research into whether animals are conscious will be action-guiding in any meaningful way. Further research into whether chickens are conscious, say, will not produce definitive certainty that they are or aren’t. (Finding out whether your favorite theory of consciousness predicts that they are conscious is only so useful, as we should have significant uncertainty about the right theory of consciousness.) And moderate changes in your credence probably shouldn’t affect what you should do. E.g., if your credence in chicken consciousness drops 20%, there is still the moral risk argument for acting as if chickens are conscious; if you have some reason for rejecting that argument, that was probably also a reason when your credence was 20% higher. And at the same time, there are potentially very great opportunity costs to waiting to act—costs that don’t make sense if decision-relevant information isn’t actually likely to come in.
I’m not very worried about the moral risk argument, because I’m not so much looking at the question of if the world should become vegan and stop farming animals or not. If society decided to do that, I wouldn’t have a problem with it. But I think if we decided to include animals in our altruistic goals, I think we would be responsible for all of them, and we may even need to count the welfare of each of them as being as important as each of us, and that seems like it would very expensive in many ways. I think if we really wanted to follow through with that, we would have to basically enslave humanity to that cause, because there are so many more of them than us. To be willing to go along with that, I would want to see much better evidence that animals have consciousness.
And I think there is a good chance that there could be useful research into animal consciousness. I don’t think it’s necessarily easy and it might not happen soon, but I think humanity will figure it out eventually, even if it takes decades. And I think if we wanted to include animals in our altruistic goals, pursuing that more completely (rather than just ending the farming of animals) could have so much more of a positive impact on the welfare of animals that it would be worth waiting.
In many cases, it seems very doubtful whether further research into whether animals are conscious will be action-guiding in any meaningful way. Further research into whether chickens are conscious, say, will not produce definitive certainty that they are or aren’t. (Finding out whether your favorite theory of consciousness predicts that they are conscious is only so useful, as we should have significant uncertainty about the right theory of consciousness.) And moderate changes in your credence probably shouldn’t affect what you should do. E.g., if your credence in chicken consciousness drops 20%, there is still the moral risk argument for acting as if chickens are conscious; if you have some reason for rejecting that argument, that was probably also a reason when your credence was 20% higher. And at the same time, there are potentially very great opportunity costs to waiting to act—costs that don’t make sense if decision-relevant information isn’t actually likely to come in.
I’m not very worried about the moral risk argument, because I’m not so much looking at the question of if the world should become vegan and stop farming animals or not. If society decided to do that, I wouldn’t have a problem with it. But I think if we decided to include animals in our altruistic goals, I think we would be responsible for all of them, and we may even need to count the welfare of each of them as being as important as each of us, and that seems like it would very expensive in many ways. I think if we really wanted to follow through with that, we would have to basically enslave humanity to that cause, because there are so many more of them than us. To be willing to go along with that, I would want to see much better evidence that animals have consciousness.
And I think there is a good chance that there could be useful research into animal consciousness. I don’t think it’s necessarily easy and it might not happen soon, but I think humanity will figure it out eventually, even if it takes decades. And I think if we wanted to include animals in our altruistic goals, pursuing that more completely (rather than just ending the farming of animals) could have so much more of a positive impact on the welfare of animals that it would be worth waiting.