What is the evidence that bivalves are much less likely to be sentient than insects? They are also small animals, so when they are eaten they add up to very large numbers.
Here is Brian Tomasik’s essay on the topic (summary: bivalves might suffer, but the case is much weaker than insect suffering). Animal Liberation by Peter Singer also has a section on bivalves[1], but I don’t have it on hand to quote right now.
The important distinction I’ve seen is that a lot of people give no moral weight to stationary bivalves, i.e. bivalves that stick to a surface and are incapable of self-directed movement. Pain is evolutionarily beneficial to creatures such as humans and chickens (and maybe insects?) to get a creature to remove itself from a harmful situation. But stationary bivalves are much less sensitive to the environment and can’t seem to move away from danger, so I don’t see any particular reason they would have evolved the ability to feel pain.
IIRC Singer is much less worried about the possibility of stationary bivalves suffering than Tomasik, to the point of being possibly-in-favor of large-scale bivalve farming in the Northeastern U.S. as a way to produce meat & filter water with ~no animal suffering
What is the evidence that bivalves are much less likely to be sentient than insects? They are also small animals, so when they are eaten they add up to very large numbers.
Here is Brian Tomasik’s essay on the topic (summary: bivalves might suffer, but the case is much weaker than insect suffering). Animal Liberation by Peter Singer also has a section on bivalves[1], but I don’t have it on hand to quote right now.
The important distinction I’ve seen is that a lot of people give no moral weight to stationary bivalves, i.e. bivalves that stick to a surface and are incapable of self-directed movement. Pain is evolutionarily beneficial to creatures such as humans and chickens (and maybe insects?) to get a creature to remove itself from a harmful situation. But stationary bivalves are much less sensitive to the environment and can’t seem to move away from danger, so I don’t see any particular reason they would have evolved the ability to feel pain.
IIRC Singer is much less worried about the possibility of stationary bivalves suffering than Tomasik, to the point of being possibly-in-favor of large-scale bivalve farming in the Northeastern U.S. as a way to produce meat & filter water with ~no animal suffering