> To what extent do you worry that we’re underinvesting in approaches outside of incremental welfare reform work right now?
Hmmm… I think it is fair to say that this isn’t in my top-tier of worries. Some things that inform that take are:
Some other major funders, that I am aware of through FAF, focus more on non-incremental welfare stuff but at the same time seem aligned with some principles of EA
As other funders focus more on it, the movement as a whole seems to adequately experiment with and explore some things that look promising from that perspective. E.g., I have been somewhat interested in institutional meat reduction work, or on more generalized field-building stuff, and some documentary efforts.
Even within EA aligned funders/ orgs a significant amount of that focused on alt-proteins.
Underappreciated but welfare stuff should increase price which can be useful for longer term decreases in demand
A decent number of the now welfaristy groups seem interested in doing some more abolitionist things, but we just haven’t identified much with a proven track record outside of corporate welfare reforms right now. If we were, I would expect them to be interested in doing that.
I would add that under your definition we have historically funded some of those efforts abolitionist efforts, eg. Crustacean Compassion working on legal recognition of sentience of some crustacean, or legal ban on cages for eggs-laying hens are good examples of more “abolition-like” approaches that we still consider good opportunities.
> Do you have any sense for when (if not now) we might reach that point where it makes more sense to invest in more abolitionist approaches?
To some extent, this whole endeavor is like a multi-armed bandit. Using that analogy, I feelacross the movement we are adequately pulling on the abolitionist levers. But we are just yet to see much in terms of payouts or signs of payouts from them. If we were to see better payouts or signs of, then EA aligned funding should be more keen to allocate towards them! I could imagine this happening if there were to see further promising signs on alternative proteins or meat reduction work but I think we are yet to see those signs. Particularly on institutional meat reduction work, I think that could be internationally scaled if the evidence base were stronger.
One complicating factor I’d quickly flag is that my impression is compared to animal rights groups, animal welfare groups tend to place relatively more epistemic weight on quantitative/ scientific evidence whereas abolitionists focus more on specific theories regarding the dynamics of past societal changes. I think this has something to do with our abolitionists reason about evidence that has historically made it hard for me to get quite excited about their approach.
It could also be worth saying that I do get pretty excited about some notable exceptions to this, like, cage-free bans, or even fur bans. Note too, that a lot of the “welfarey” cage-free work seems a necessary precursor to the “abolitionisty” cage bans.
> To what extent do you worry that we’re underinvesting in approaches outside of incremental welfare reform work right now?
Hmmm… I think it is fair to say that this isn’t in my top-tier of worries. Some things that inform that take are:
Some other major funders, that I am aware of through FAF, focus more on non-incremental welfare stuff but at the same time seem aligned with some principles of EA
As other funders focus more on it, the movement as a whole seems to adequately experiment with and explore some things that look promising from that perspective. E.g., I have been somewhat interested in institutional meat reduction work, or on more generalized field-building stuff, and some documentary efforts.
Even within EA aligned funders/ orgs a significant amount of that focused on alt-proteins.
Underappreciated but welfare stuff should increase price which can be useful for longer term decreases in demand
A decent number of the now welfaristy groups seem interested in doing some more abolitionist things, but we just haven’t identified much with a proven track record outside of corporate welfare reforms right now. If we were, I would expect them to be interested in doing that.
I would add that under your definition we have historically funded some of those efforts abolitionist efforts, eg. Crustacean Compassion working on legal recognition of sentience of some crustacean, or legal ban on cages for eggs-laying hens are good examples of more “abolition-like” approaches that we still consider good opportunities.
> Do you have any sense for when (if not now) we might reach that point where it makes more sense to invest in more abolitionist approaches?
To some extent, this whole endeavor is like a multi-armed bandit. Using that analogy, I feel across the movement we are adequately pulling on the abolitionist levers. But we are just yet to see much in terms of payouts or signs of payouts from them. If we were to see better payouts or signs of, then EA aligned funding should be more keen to allocate towards them! I could imagine this happening if there were to see further promising signs on alternative proteins or meat reduction work but I think we are yet to see those signs. Particularly on institutional meat reduction work, I think that could be internationally scaled if the evidence base were stronger.
One complicating factor I’d quickly flag is that my impression is compared to animal rights groups, animal welfare groups tend to place relatively more epistemic weight on quantitative/ scientific evidence whereas abolitionists focus more on specific theories regarding the dynamics of past societal changes. I think this has something to do with our abolitionists reason about evidence that has historically made it hard for me to get quite excited about their approach.
It could also be worth saying that I do get pretty excited about some notable exceptions to this, like, cage-free bans, or even fur bans. Note too, that a lot of the “welfarey” cage-free work seems a necessary precursor to the “abolitionisty” cage bans.