It’s true that meat eating is closer to what we actually care about, but it’s worth singling out causal pathways from saving lives and increasing incomes/wealth, as potential backfire effects. “Meat eating problem” seems likely to be understood too generally as the problem of animal consumption, without explanation. I’d prefer a more unique expression to isolate the specific causal pathways.
Some other ideas:
meat eating backfire (problem)
more meat backfire/problem
meat backfire (problem)
(more) animal product backfire (problem)
(Eggs and other animal products besides meat matter, too.)
Yep I’m happy with any of these, I especially like the “meat eating backfire” because it kind of implies we’re shooting in the right direction in the first place. Also you are right that in terms of suffering (especially here in Uganda) its probably the eggs that might be a bigger problem even than the meat.
Of course, there are other ways meat (and other animal product) consumption could increase from well-intentioned EA interventions than just by saving lives or increasing incomes/wealth. For example, interventions that involve subsidizing animal welfare improvements can carry this backfire risk.
I’m less worried about confusion with other problems, because they don’t come up as often, and researchers are more likely to account for them in animal welfare research anyway. All effects on nonhuman animals are usually omitted from analyses of interventions aimed specifically at helping humans, including GHD and CGRs. It’s worth reminding people of these backfire risks.
I could also argue that “the meat eater problem” is just as ambiguous because it could easily be misinterpreted as just the problem that everyone all around the world eats meat in general.
I don’t think precision is necessarily the be all and end all of names ;).
It’s true that meat eating is closer to what we actually care about, but it’s worth singling out causal pathways from saving lives and increasing incomes/wealth, as potential backfire effects. “Meat eating problem” seems likely to be understood too generally as the problem of animal consumption, without explanation. I’d prefer a more unique expression to isolate the specific causal pathways.
Some other ideas:
meat eating backfire (problem)
more meat backfire/problem
meat backfire (problem)
(more) animal product backfire (problem)
(Eggs and other animal products besides meat matter, too.)
Yep I’m happy with any of these, I especially like the “meat eating backfire” because it kind of implies we’re shooting in the right direction in the first place. Also you are right that in terms of suffering (especially here in Uganda) its probably the eggs that might be a bigger problem even than the meat.
Of course, there are other ways meat (and other animal product) consumption could increase from well-intentioned EA interventions than just by saving lives or increasing incomes/wealth. For example, interventions that involve subsidizing animal welfare improvements can carry this backfire risk.
I’m less worried about confusion with other problems, because they don’t come up as often, and researchers are more likely to account for them in animal welfare research anyway. All effects on nonhuman animals are usually omitted from analyses of interventions aimed specifically at helping humans, including GHD and CGRs. It’s worth reminding people of these backfire risks.
It’s true.
I could also argue that “the meat eater problem” is just as ambiguous because it could easily be misinterpreted as just the problem that everyone all around the world eats meat in general.
I don’t think precision is necessarily the be all and end all of names ;).