I agree with some of the comments below—I think most EAs support things like lab-grown meat for animal welfare reasons. If there’s a strong argument (which I think there is) for lab-grown meat ALSO being the best possible thing you could do for biodiversity, and making that argument to the right people could literally 10x the amount of money going to lab-grown meat R&D per year, then I think we should making that argument. If you’re consequentialist about it, the motives of the GBF are irrelevant. What matters is that they could massively fund lab-grown meat, and nobody is argueing to them that it’s their interest to do so.
And about huw’s point below (ie. many lobbyists make arguments that don’t align with their true motivations), I think that’s how lobbying usually works. It’s pretty easy to imagine EAs going to a COP and making the 100% true and good faith argument that lab-grown meat would be more effective for protecting biodiversity than, say, “protecting” on paper a random, 150-square km patch of water in the South Pacific. Those EAs might not care about biodiversity themselves, but if they succeeded in getting 0.1% of the budget dedicated to lab grown meat R&D, and thus DOUBLING annual investment in the sector, that would also be awesome for animal welfare.
I agree with some of the comments below—I think most EAs support things like lab-grown meat for animal welfare reasons. If there’s a strong argument (which I think there is) for lab-grown meat ALSO being the best possible thing you could do for biodiversity, and making that argument to the right people could literally 10x the amount of money going to lab-grown meat R&D per year, then I think we should making that argument. If you’re consequentialist about it, the motives of the GBF are irrelevant. What matters is that they could massively fund lab-grown meat, and nobody is argueing to them that it’s their interest to do so.
And about huw’s point below (ie. many lobbyists make arguments that don’t align with their true motivations), I think that’s how lobbying usually works. It’s pretty easy to imagine EAs going to a COP and making the 100% true and good faith argument that lab-grown meat would be more effective for protecting biodiversity than, say, “protecting” on paper a random, 150-square km patch of water in the South Pacific. Those EAs might not care about biodiversity themselves, but if they succeeded in getting 0.1% of the budget dedicated to lab grown meat R&D, and thus DOUBLING annual investment in the sector, that would also be awesome for animal welfare.