Although this post provides some very good calculations and information, it misses the key pointâit is 100% value-dependentâand the post is plain advocacy.
I think most people would prefer decreasing human healthy life by a few minutes across billions of humans over roughly a century over soon causing to one pet tens of hours more of annoying pain, tens of hours more of hurtful pain, a few hours more of disabling pain, and a few seconds more of excruciating pain.
Compare the paragraph âDo you feel like the above negative effects (...) justify (...)? I do notâ to âBased on my values the results of these quick calculations do not seem to justify (...)â. It reads very different.
I understand you think I am overconfident about my views, but I want the post to represent these, and I worry the updates you suggested would made it sound like I am less confident than what I actually am.
I didnât want to go beyond commenting the formâhow the post is presented. But as you answered, Iâd like to ask you something about the content as well:
Iâm so confused on why you wrote the post given the preferences you believe people (EAs?) have and that you are (almost?) vegetarian/âvegan. Making the change you propose decreases a bit animal pain⊠while decreasing the amount of meat one eats decreases it much more.
Iâm so confused on why you wrote the post given the preferences you believe people (EAs?) have and that you are (almost?) vegetarian/âvegan.
I published the original post for One Step for Animals, which targets a general audience (not aligned with effective altruism) that may well find decreasing meat consumption harder than replacing chicken meat with beef or pork (without changing meat consumption much).
Making the change you propose decreases a bit animal pain⊠while decreasing the amount of meat one eats decreases it much more.
Replacing chicken meat with plant-based foods only decreases pain slightly more than replacing it with beef or pork.
Hi Vasco, thanks for the answer and the upvote (I guess it was you).
I think most people would prefer decreasing human healthy life by a few minutes across billions of humans over roughly a century over soon causing to one pet tens of hours more of annoying pain, tens of hours more of hurtful pain, a few hours more of disabling pain, and a few seconds more of excruciating pain.
I first want to say that I imagine you just answered fast and without giving it much thought, so I donât expect this to really reflect your believes. Even so I have to reply what is written.
Maybe it is true that most people would prefer this. It still would be a values-dependent issue.
Even if it would be true that most people feel like this, you cannot pretend that most people feel the same way about a pet than about a random animal, less so about what they regard as food. I mean, take a look around! I hope I donât need to expand on this. We are not speaking about how we think people should feel but how they actually feel.
There are more aspects to the issue besides animal suffering vs (human health issues due to) GHG emissions, and people vary on their values related to these issues. The numbers you do in your post are partial and you donât give any reasoning on why you presumably think that the other aspects of the issue are less relevant and therefore you donât bother to quantify/âcompare them.
Maybe you are addressing exclusively EAs. Then, of course, your assertion on peopleâs preferences is much more accurate. Still, 100% values-dependent and with more relevant aspects besides pain and emissions.
I understand you think I am overconfident about my views, but I want the post to represent these, and I worry the updates you suggested would made it sound like I am less confident than what I actually am.
It is not an issue about expressed confidence but about not acknowledging that your conclusions are values-dependent. For example, âgiven my values I am 100% confident that (...), plus I believe that most people (in EA) have similar enough values to mine so that these conclusions apply 100% to them tooâ expresses total confidence in your views while acknowledges that your conclusions are not universal but values-dependent, so it reflects reality more accurately.
In this line, it is very good that at the end of your post you acknowledge the possible health issues and give people worried about this the option to go in the direction to vegan/âvegetarian. Note that this is a veiled acknowledgement that more aspects can play a significant role in your conclusions and that these depend on oneâs values. Letâs make it explicit!
Hi Vasco, thanks for the answer and the upvote (I guess it was you).
I actually (lightly) downvoted your initial comment because you broadly dismissed the arguments made in the post by asserting they are value-dependent without engaging with the implied empirical claims. There is a sense in which everything is value-dependent, so I find this type of language very unproductive.
I upvoted your last comment about the content.
Even if it would be true that most people feel like this, you cannot pretend that most people feel the same way about a pet than about a random animal, less so about what they regard as food.
Agreed. However, the question is whether there is a relevant difference between causing pain to a random pet and random chicken. Rethink Prioritiesâ median welfare ranges of chickens and pigs are 0.332 and 0.515 (humans have the reference value of 1), so I expect the difference to be quite small from an hedonistic perspective.
It is great that you base your arguments on other peopleâs research. Then add a sentence or two clarifying it (in addition, this would add some information on the values you used). All these are very speculative still, but this is not the issue -though it could be mentioned.
The issue with your post is that you claim something you do not demonstrate at all. If youâd framed the post as something similar to âReplacing chicken meat with beef or pork: pain vs emissions analysisâ, your post would be really very good. I still think you should add some description to the values used, but just including the reference from RP would probably suffice for this. And if itâd include the information that replacing chicken with no-meat does not move the needle nearly as much as replacing it for beef or pork, it would be even better, as this is very relevant context.
But this is not what you do. You have done very interesting and useful calculations. But your claims go much, much further than what you can claim with them. You narrow your analysis to a comparison of two specific aspects of the issue, basically neglecting the rest. I hope you see that the issue goes beyond pain and emissions. You most likely think that these two aspects are the most important ones for the analysis but do no support -or even mention- this. Doing it would probably clarify the values behind your analysisâif you really want to go broad. Or you could just say sth like âassuming pain and emissions are the driving aspects of this problem...â. But do not even do this.
A stupid example. Thereâs people who care mostly about the amount of pleasure in the universe and (claim) not to care much for suffering. Assuming chickens get some pleasure at all in their lives, the amount of pleasure in the universe would increase by eating more chicken and less pork or beef. Even if they currently wouldnât experience any pleasure, the potential would be huge⊠and the analysis completely opposite to yours. And this is not taking into account any other aspects than animal pleasure.
I am sure you see all this, and that you wanted to write as short an essay as possible. But to do this, then you have to be very specificâotherwise, a very good analysis like yours ends up not holding the water you claim it holds.
Thanks for the comment, Miquel.
I think most people would prefer decreasing human healthy life by a few minutes across billions of humans over roughly a century over soon causing to one pet tens of hours more of annoying pain, tens of hours more of hurtful pain, a few hours more of disabling pain, and a few seconds more of excruciating pain.
I understand you think I am overconfident about my views, but I want the post to represent these, and I worry the updates you suggested would made it sound like I am less confident than what I actually am.
I didnât want to go beyond commenting the formâhow the post is presented. But as you answered, Iâd like to ask you something about the content as well:
Iâm so confused on why you wrote the post given the preferences you believe people (EAs?) have and that you are (almost?) vegetarian/âvegan. Making the change you propose decreases a bit animal pain⊠while decreasing the amount of meat one eats decreases it much more.
I published the original post for One Step for Animals, which targets a general audience (not aligned with effective altruism) that may well find decreasing meat consumption harder than replacing chicken meat with beef or pork (without changing meat consumption much).
Replacing chicken meat with plant-based foods only decreases pain slightly more than replacing it with beef or pork.
This is very surprising to me! Super interesting! To be honest, I find this as important as the numbers you give in the post.
Hi Vasco, thanks for the answer and the upvote (I guess it was you).
I first want to say that I imagine you just answered fast and without giving it much thought, so I donât expect this to really reflect your believes. Even so I have to reply what is written.
Maybe it is true that most people would prefer this. It still would be a values-dependent issue.
Even if it would be true that most people feel like this, you cannot pretend that most people feel the same way about a pet than about a random animal, less so about what they regard as food. I mean, take a look around! I hope I donât need to expand on this. We are not speaking about how we think people should feel but how they actually feel.
There are more aspects to the issue besides animal suffering vs (human health issues due to) GHG emissions, and people vary on their values related to these issues. The numbers you do in your post are partial and you donât give any reasoning on why you presumably think that the other aspects of the issue are less relevant and therefore you donât bother to quantify/âcompare them.
Maybe you are addressing exclusively EAs. Then, of course, your assertion on peopleâs preferences is much more accurate. Still, 100% values-dependent and with more relevant aspects besides pain and emissions.
It is not an issue about expressed confidence but about not acknowledging that your conclusions are values-dependent. For example, âgiven my values I am 100% confident that (...), plus I believe that most people (in EA) have similar enough values to mine so that these conclusions apply 100% to them tooâ expresses total confidence in your views while acknowledges that your conclusions are not universal but values-dependent, so it reflects reality more accurately.
In this line, it is very good that at the end of your post you acknowledge the possible health issues and give people worried about this the option to go in the direction to vegan/âvegetarian. Note that this is a veiled acknowledgement that more aspects can play a significant role in your conclusions and that these depend on oneâs values. Letâs make it explicit!
I actually (lightly) downvoted your initial comment because you broadly dismissed the arguments made in the post by asserting they are value-dependent without engaging with the implied empirical claims. There is a sense in which everything is value-dependent, so I find this type of language very unproductive.
I upvoted your last comment about the content.
Agreed. However, the question is whether there is a relevant difference between causing pain to a random pet and random chicken. Rethink Prioritiesâ median welfare ranges of chickens and pigs are 0.332 and 0.515 (humans have the reference value of 1), so I expect the difference to be quite small from an hedonistic perspective.
Hi Vasco, merry Christmas and so on!
It is great that you base your arguments on other peopleâs research. Then add a sentence or two clarifying it (in addition, this would add some information on the values you used). All these are very speculative still, but this is not the issue -though it could be mentioned.
The issue with your post is that you claim something you do not demonstrate at all. If youâd framed the post as something similar to âReplacing chicken meat with beef or pork: pain vs emissions analysisâ, your post would be really very good. I still think you should add some description to the values used, but just including the reference from RP would probably suffice for this. And if itâd include the information that replacing chicken with no-meat does not move the needle nearly as much as replacing it for beef or pork, it would be even better, as this is very relevant context.
But this is not what you do. You have done very interesting and useful calculations. But your claims go much, much further than what you can claim with them. You narrow your analysis to a comparison of two specific aspects of the issue, basically neglecting the rest. I hope you see that the issue goes beyond pain and emissions. You most likely think that these two aspects are the most important ones for the analysis but do no support -or even mention- this. Doing it would probably clarify the values behind your analysisâif you really want to go broad. Or you could just say sth like âassuming pain and emissions are the driving aspects of this problem...â. But do not even do this.
A stupid example. Thereâs people who care mostly about the amount of pleasure in the universe and (claim) not to care much for suffering. Assuming chickens get some pleasure at all in their lives, the amount of pleasure in the universe would increase by eating more chicken and less pork or beef. Even if they currently wouldnât experience any pleasure, the potential would be huge⊠and the analysis completely opposite to yours. And this is not taking into account any other aspects than animal pleasure.
I am sure you see all this, and that you wanted to write as short an essay as possible. But to do this, then you have to be very specificâotherwise, a very good analysis like yours ends up not holding the water you claim it holds.