[Objection] from Robi Rahman: “A person choosing to eat 1kg less chicken results in 0.6 kg less expected chicken produced in the long run, which averts 20 days of chicken suffering. A comparable sacrifice would be to turn off your air conditioning for 3 days, which in expectation reduces future global warming by 10^(-14) °C and reduces suffering by zero.”
Without quibbling with the precise numbers, I think this is fundamentally a point about the importance of the two cause areas.
Actually, what I meant was fundamentally not a point about the importance of either cause area. I think that even if total harms from climate are greater than total harms from factory farming, the marginal harm reduction from changing individual behavior on diet is probably greater than the marginal harm reduction from changing personal energy consumption. I still think you’re right overall that individual action on animal welfare is over-emphasized relative to individual action on climate or political/technology interventions on animal welfare, but this is one possible justification for the behavior of a lot of EAs I’ve met who put lots of effort into changing their diet but none into reducing their energy usage.
Actually, what I meant was fundamentally not a point about the importance of either cause area. I think that even if total harms from climate are greater than total harms from factory farming, the marginal harm reduction from changing individual behavior on diet is probably greater than the marginal harm reduction from changing personal energy consumption. I still think you’re right overall that individual action on animal welfare is over-emphasized relative to individual action on climate or political/technology interventions on animal welfare, but this is one possible justification for the behavior of a lot of EAs I’ve met who put lots of effort into changing their diet but none into reducing their energy usage.