Iâm supportive of doing this kind of thinking, but I think taking your beliefs to their logical conclusion suggests we should be looking to found charities that will end all life on earth; nuclear PROLIFERATION charities, perhaps charities that seek to make and release bioweapons that will kill of small animals, insects, etc. and maybe just charities that start wildfires. Have you given much thought to this?
Also, why does everyone assume that small organisms necessarily live net negative lives?
One should think at the margin. Starting organisations working on extreme life extension does not have to be the best way to increase human-years. I think GiveWellâs top charities increase human-years more cost-effectively than the vast majority of work on aging. Likewise, increasing the chance of all soil nematodes, mites, and springtails dying through increasing the risk of nuclear war or pandemics does not have to be among the best ways to decrease their animal-years. In fact, I believe they are super bad ways of doing it. I think they would decrease human-years due to increasing the expected annual deaths from nuclear war and pandemics, thus decreasing future food production, and cropland-years, and therefore increasing the animal-years of soil nematodes, mites, and springtails. Even if increasing the risk of nuclear war and pandemics decreased the animal-years of these, I predict the cost-effectiveness respecting an increase in the probability of extinction would be astronomically low. I got a nearterm annual risk of human extinction from nuclear war of 5.93*10^-12, and I guess the probability of all soil nematodes, mites, and springtails dying would be orders of magnitude lower.
I am sceptical that illegal activities like starting wild fires would be cost-effective. I would be open to donating to charities pursuing these in principle. I do not shy away from counterintuitive conclusions. However, I am just very sceptical they would be cost-effective, or even just beneficial instead of harmful. Their scale would necessarily be limited due to the illegal nature of their work, which means supporting them would also likely be illegal, and therefore have to be super cost-effective to outweigh the expected decrease in future donations linked to the risk of fines, and being arrested, and outweigh the expected decrease in direct impact linked to the risk reputational damage worsening oneâs career.
C. elegans shares its natural environment with a diverse animal community, in particular arthropods, molluscs and other nematodes, some of which also feed on microbes proliferating upon plant decomposition. Many are potential dispersal vectors as well as predators of C. elegans. Frequently co-occurring predators include fungi, which, depending on the species, invade the nematode through spores attaching to the cuticle or the intestine, or use trapping devices that immobilize the animal and perforate it (Figure 2). Nematophagous mites, springtails and nematodes are other potential predators often encountered in the C. elegans habitat.
The broader nematode community associated with C. elegans comprises microbivorous nematodes, often including other rhabditid nematodes, such as Oscheius sp., diplogastrids or panagrolaims, which likely compete with C. elegans for microbial food resources. Also found in rotting fruits are fungal-eating and predatory nematodes. Sometimes, C. elegans co-occurs with other Caenorhabditis species in the same location or even in the same few square millimetres of substrate. Given the rapid proliferation upon food availability, intraspecific competition for food is probably substantial.
I am focussing on nematodes because I calculated the increase in the welfare of soil nematodes from increasing cropland to range from 90.5 % to 94.3 % of the increase in the welfare of soil nematodes, mites, and springtails, depending on the original biome.
I suppose Iâm saying that I think your beliefs suggest we should try to annihilate the world or try to extinguish all life.
I think hidden in a lot of your analysis is one of the following
Negative utilitarianism. I think this is a fine belief to hold but I think it should be stated outright.
An assumption that the lives of many/âmost/âall animals is net negative by default and we need evidence that they are positive for them not to be considered net negative.
I think 2 is more likely but I think a lot of the people that think along your lines (maybe someone like Benthamâs Bulldog too), seem to assume that life is likely to be negative and I just donât see why this assumption should be expected. We donât really see any animals committing suicide, they clearly show desire/âpreference to live (they try to escape death at many costs), a lot of life for humans who we consider to usually be net positive is spent on things where we âstruggleâ to maintain existence and yet most people are fairly happy with their life.
I also agree that we should be highly uncertain about whether soil creatures live positive or negative lives but your analysis more or less assumes that the sign is negative and everything else follows from there.
On death, most of the life of a creature is usually not spent during itâs death. Iâm happy for interventions for farmed animals to reduce pain during death (and humans too!) but I think basing a lot of calculations on this doesnât capture most of the animalâs life.
Last, I think your analysis ignores something I consider to be extremely important and in fact, the main reason Iâm (and I think others should be) vegan. Namely, a ~daily reminder that animals matter and a reduction in cognitive dissonance and the effect it has on others. I think my (and any other) individual dietâs direct harm is uncertain, has a lot of crucial considerations, etc. but, I think a lot of rationalists like to pretend they are above usual human thoughts/âinstincts on this matter. I discuss this more here.
I fully endorse expectational total hedonistic utilitarianism. I strongly believe there are many experiences that are better than nothing. Negative utilitarianism implies that the painless elimination of all experiences forever would be as good as utopian lives for all beings forever. So negative utilitarianism makes no sense to me.
As I said in my comment above, I am very uncertain about whether soil nematodes, mites, and springtails have positive or negative. However, I would not see the absence of suicide among these animals as compelling evidence that they have positive lives. I estimated 6.37 % of humans have negative lives, but only 0.00946 % commited suicide in 2021, 0.149 % (= 9.46*10^-5/â0.0637) as many as those I estimate to have negative lives.
I would get more counterintuitive conclusions if I assumed soil nematodes, mites, and springtails have positive lives (although this is not a reason for me to assume their lives are negative). Generally improving human lives, and the conditions of farmed animals would then harm soil animals much more than it benefits humans and farmed animals.
@Marcus Abramovitch đž, I am tagging you because I forgot to reply to the last paragraph of your comment. I do not think it makes senses to remind myself and others to help animals by doing something that I believe actually harms animals. However, I still eat fully plant-based because I think the benefits from increased donations are greater than the harm caused to animals due to less agricultural-land-years.
Your model treats microbial interactions as universally negative. Yet the scientific literature shows nematodes host beneficial symbionts that aid growth and immunity. By omitting these, this model is incompleteâand biased toward suffering. Even slight adjustments to the qualia of rest or seeking behavior would skew the outcome.
I have not covered any microbes. Are you suggesting that increasing cropland, thus decreasing the number of soil ematodes, is harmful because it decreases the number of microbes? I would agree that increasing cropland decreases the number of microbes, and I would not be surprised if the effects on microbes were much larger than those on soil nematodes, mites, and springtails. From Table S1 of Bar-on et al. (2018), there are 10^30 terrestrial deep subsurface bacteria, 10^9 (= 10^(30 â 21)) times as many as nematodes, and I guess the welfare range of bacteria can seasily be much larger than 10^-9 that of nematodes. However, the number of bacteria per unit area is correlated with the number of soil nematodes, mites, and springtails per unit area, as both are driven by net primary production (NPP), and I speculate bacteria have negative lives. So I believe my conclusion that increasing cropland is beneficial would hold accounting for bacteria.
Iâm supportive of doing this kind of thinking, but I think taking your beliefs to their logical conclusion suggests we should be looking to found charities that will end all life on earth; nuclear PROLIFERATION charities, perhaps charities that seek to make and release bioweapons that will kill of small animals, insects, etc. and maybe just charities that start wildfires. Have you given much thought to this?
Also, why does everyone assume that small organisms necessarily live net negative lives?
Thanks for the comment, Marcus!
One should think at the margin. Starting organisations working on extreme life extension does not have to be the best way to increase human-years. I think GiveWellâs top charities increase human-years more cost-effectively than the vast majority of work on aging. Likewise, increasing the chance of all soil nematodes, mites, and springtails dying through increasing the risk of nuclear war or pandemics does not have to be among the best ways to decrease their animal-years. In fact, I believe they are super bad ways of doing it. I think they would decrease human-years due to increasing the expected annual deaths from nuclear war and pandemics, thus decreasing future food production, and cropland-years, and therefore increasing the animal-years of soil nematodes, mites, and springtails. Even if increasing the risk of nuclear war and pandemics decreased the animal-years of these, I predict the cost-effectiveness respecting an increase in the probability of extinction would be astronomically low. I got a nearterm annual risk of human extinction from nuclear war of 5.93*10^-12, and I guess the probability of all soil nematodes, mites, and springtails dying would be orders of magnitude lower.
I am sceptical that illegal activities like starting wild fires would be cost-effective. I would be open to donating to charities pursuing these in principle. I do not shy away from counterintuitive conclusions. However, I am just very sceptical they would be cost-effective, or even just beneficial instead of harmful. Their scale would necessarily be limited due to the illegal nature of their work, which means supporting them would also likely be illegal, and therefore have to be super cost-effective to outweigh the expected decrease in future donations linked to the risk of fines, and being arrested, and outweigh the expected decrease in direct impact linked to the risk reputational damage worsening oneâs career.
I am very uncertain about whether soil nematodes, mites, and springtails have positive or negative lives. I calculated soil nematodes, mites, and springtails have negative lives with a probability of 58.7 %, 55.8 %, and 55.0 %. Note at least some of nematodesâ deaths seem to be quite painful[1]. From FĂ©lix and Braendle (2010):
From Frézal and Félix (2015):
I am focussing on nematodes because I calculated the increase in the welfare of soil nematodes from increasing cropland to range from 90.5 % to 94.3 % of the increase in the welfare of soil nematodes, mites, and springtails, depending on the original biome.
I agree that we should be thinking at the margin.
I suppose Iâm saying that I think your beliefs suggest we should try to annihilate the world or try to extinguish all life.
I think hidden in a lot of your analysis is one of the following
Negative utilitarianism. I think this is a fine belief to hold but I think it should be stated outright.
An assumption that the lives of many/âmost/âall animals is net negative by default and we need evidence that they are positive for them not to be considered net negative.
I think 2 is more likely but I think a lot of the people that think along your lines (maybe someone like Benthamâs Bulldog too), seem to assume that life is likely to be negative and I just donât see why this assumption should be expected. We donât really see any animals committing suicide, they clearly show desire/âpreference to live (they try to escape death at many costs), a lot of life for humans who we consider to usually be net positive is spent on things where we âstruggleâ to maintain existence and yet most people are fairly happy with their life.
I also agree that we should be highly uncertain about whether soil creatures live positive or negative lives but your analysis more or less assumes that the sign is negative and everything else follows from there.
On death, most of the life of a creature is usually not spent during itâs death. Iâm happy for interventions for farmed animals to reduce pain during death (and humans too!) but I think basing a lot of calculations on this doesnât capture most of the animalâs life.
Last, I think your analysis ignores something I consider to be extremely important and in fact, the main reason Iâm (and I think others should be) vegan. Namely, a ~daily reminder that animals matter and a reduction in cognitive dissonance and the effect it has on others. I think my (and any other) individual dietâs direct harm is uncertain, has a lot of crucial considerations, etc. but, I think a lot of rationalists like to pretend they are above usual human thoughts/âinstincts on this matter. I discuss this more here.
I fully endorse expectational total hedonistic utilitarianism. I strongly believe there are many experiences that are better than nothing. Negative utilitarianism implies that the painless elimination of all experiences forever would be as good as utopian lives for all beings forever. So negative utilitarianism makes no sense to me.
As I said in my comment above, I am very uncertain about whether soil nematodes, mites, and springtails have positive or negative. However, I would not see the absence of suicide among these animals as compelling evidence that they have positive lives. I estimated 6.37 % of humans have negative lives, but only 0.00946 % commited suicide in 2021, 0.149 % (= 9.46*10^-5/â0.0637) as many as those I estimate to have negative lives.
I would get more counterintuitive conclusions if I assumed soil nematodes, mites, and springtails have positive lives (although this is not a reason for me to assume their lives are negative). Generally improving human lives, and the conditions of farmed animals would then harm soil animals much more than it benefits humans and farmed animals.
@Marcus Abramovitch đž, I am tagging you because I forgot to reply to the last paragraph of your comment. I do not think it makes senses to remind myself and others to help animals by doing something that I believe actually harms animals. However, I still eat fully plant-based because I think the benefits from increased donations are greater than the harm caused to animals due to less agricultural-land-years.
Your model treats microbial interactions as universally negative. Yet the scientific literature shows nematodes host beneficial symbionts that aid growth and immunity. By omitting these, this model is incompleteâand biased toward suffering. Even slight adjustments to the qualia of rest or seeking behavior would skew the outcome.
Welcome to the EA Forum, Scott!
I have not covered any microbes. Are you suggesting that increasing cropland, thus decreasing the number of soil ematodes, is harmful because it decreases the number of microbes? I would agree that increasing cropland decreases the number of microbes, and I would not be surprised if the effects on microbes were much larger than those on soil nematodes, mites, and springtails. From Table S1 of Bar-on et al. (2018), there are 10^30 terrestrial deep subsurface bacteria, 10^9 (= 10^(30 â 21)) times as many as nematodes, and I guess the welfare range of bacteria can seasily be much larger than 10^-9 that of nematodes. However, the number of bacteria per unit area is correlated with the number of soil nematodes, mites, and springtails per unit area, as both are driven by net primary production (NPP), and I speculate bacteria have negative lives. So I believe my conclusion that increasing cropland is beneficial would hold accounting for bacteria.