This perspective is widely restated but I’m not sure this is supportable by argument:
Isn’t it almost certain that humans will eventually destroy most existing habitats? We’ve already destroyed in the vicinity of half, right, by proportion of land?
Most social change is a fringe interest initially. If we have good reasons to care about animal welfare in the abstract, then the interest in this may continue to increase. If one does not think have confidence in these arguments, then instead, mightn’t one want to take moral uncertainty or moral pluralism more seriously?
Creating animal environments in new planets in which they would not naturally live will involve a significantly different discussion compared to the treatment of wild animals.
In general, are you trying to generalise from humans’ treatment of animals in the 21st century to humans’ treatment of animals, in which modification of animals is very difficult, to an environment for the next thousands of years, that may or may not be in a simulated environment, grown in vitro, genetically engineered, et cetera, in which modification may be less difficult. If this is the generalisation that you are trying to make, then more thorough argumentation is needed. Obviously I’m also trying to generalise to the future, but the current naturalistic biases aren’t an obviously particularly relevant factor when the future situation is fleshed out more concretely.
Although most people currently don’t want to alter nature, in any circumstances that we worry about, people will have different capacities, that shape different views, about something that would no longer be aptly called “nature”, and so we need to reason differently about what to expect.
This perspective is widely restated but I’m not sure this is supportable by argument:
Isn’t it almost certain that humans will eventually destroy most existing habitats? We’ve already destroyed in the vicinity of half, right, by proportion of land?
Most social change is a fringe interest initially. If we have good reasons to care about animal welfare in the abstract, then the interest in this may continue to increase. If one does not think have confidence in these arguments, then instead, mightn’t one want to take moral uncertainty or moral pluralism more seriously?
Creating animal environments in new planets in which they would not naturally live will involve a significantly different discussion compared to the treatment of wild animals.
In general, are you trying to generalise from humans’ treatment of animals in the 21st century to humans’ treatment of animals, in which modification of animals is very difficult, to an environment for the next thousands of years, that may or may not be in a simulated environment, grown in vitro, genetically engineered, et cetera, in which modification may be less difficult. If this is the generalisation that you are trying to make, then more thorough argumentation is needed. Obviously I’m also trying to generalise to the future, but the current naturalistic biases aren’t an obviously particularly relevant factor when the future situation is fleshed out more concretely.
Although most people currently don’t want to alter nature, in any circumstances that we worry about, people will have different capacities, that shape different views, about something that would no longer be aptly called “nature”, and so we need to reason differently about what to expect.