If I’m reading correctly, you found that many researchers thought “it’s unlikely that they will find [cost-competitive WAW interventions]” which surprised me, since it seems like you found reducing aquatic noise to be borderline already. Did you just mean in the very near future? Or do many researchers think it’s unlikely we will ever identify such interventions?
Good question :) I researched aquatic noise because that was the only intervention where it seemed at least possible for me to estimate cost-effectiveness. But the estimate ended up being so uncertain that it didn’t provide much information. Science simply doesn’t have answers yet. I expect it to be the same for most WAW interventions. That is, I expect there to be huge uncertainty on how cost-effective they are (and whether they are even good for WAW when all things are considered), and in the best-case scenario, they might be as cost-effective as farmed animal welfare interventions. But we might never find out if we are in the best-case scenario. It’s difficult for me to say that aquatic noise is not worth looking into further because I spent like six months researching it but I think that for now there are enough better ideas in farmed animal welfare space so I don’t think we should pursue it. I can see WAW interventions being worth it if the animal advocacy movement gets a lot more funding or, I don’t know, very advanced artificial intelligence can be used to figure out all ecological consequences of nature somehow. Assuming AI does not change everything, I’d give a 15% chance that in the next 15 years, someone will find a WAW intervention that to me would seem “directly cost-effective (10%+ as cost-effective in expectation as chicken welfare reforms)” and “non-controversial (>40% support and <30% oppose in a US poll).” I’m not counting WAW interventions that have to do with the far future or changing values of the society here.
NOTE: I edited the shortform text to match what I say here. I used to say that I’m on the fence whether EA resources should be spent on reducing aquatic noise.
Thank you for sharing this!
If I’m reading correctly, you found that many researchers thought “it’s unlikely that they will find [cost-competitive WAW interventions]” which surprised me, since it seems like you found reducing aquatic noise to be borderline already. Did you just mean in the very near future? Or do many researchers think it’s unlikely we will ever identify such interventions?
Good question :) I researched aquatic noise because that was the only intervention where it seemed at least possible for me to estimate cost-effectiveness. But the estimate ended up being so uncertain that it didn’t provide much information. Science simply doesn’t have answers yet. I expect it to be the same for most WAW interventions. That is, I expect there to be huge uncertainty on how cost-effective they are (and whether they are even good for WAW when all things are considered), and in the best-case scenario, they might be as cost-effective as farmed animal welfare interventions. But we might never find out if we are in the best-case scenario. It’s difficult for me to say that aquatic noise is not worth looking into further because I spent like six months researching it but I think that for now there are enough better ideas in farmed animal welfare space so I don’t think we should pursue it. I can see WAW interventions being worth it if the animal advocacy movement gets a lot more funding or, I don’t know, very advanced artificial intelligence can be used to figure out all ecological consequences of nature somehow. Assuming AI does not change everything, I’d give a 15% chance that in the next 15 years, someone will find a WAW intervention that to me would seem “directly cost-effective (10%+ as cost-effective in expectation as chicken welfare reforms)” and “non-controversial (>40% support and <30% oppose in a US poll).” I’m not counting WAW interventions that have to do with the far future or changing values of the society here.
NOTE: I edited the shortform text to match what I say here. I used to say that I’m on the fence whether EA resources should be spent on reducing aquatic noise.