I canât speak for OP but I thought the whole point of its âworldview diversification bucketsâ was to discourage this sort of comparison by acknowledging the size of the error bars around these kind of comparisons, and that fundamentally prioritisation decisions between them are influenced more by different worldviews rather than the possibility of acquiring better data or making more accurate predictions around outcomes. This could be interpreted as an argument against the theme of the week and not just this post :-)
The necessity of making funding decisions means interventions in animal welfare and global health and development are compared at least implicitly. I think it is better to make them explicit for reasoning transparency, and having discussions which could eventually lead to better decisions. Saying there is too much uncertainty, and there is nothing we can do will not move things forward.
the possibility a particular intervention has a positive or negative or neutral impact on the welfare of a fish is guesswork seems very reasonable and very unfavourable to many animal related causes
What do you think about humane slaughter interventions, such as the electrical stunning interventions promoted by the Centre for Aquaculture Progress? âMost sea bream and sea bass today are killed by being immersed in an ice slurry, a process which is not considered acceptable by the World Organisation for Animal Healthâ. âElectrical stunning reliably renders fish unconscious in less than one second, reducing their sufferingâ. Rough analogy, but a human dying in an electric chair suffers less than one dying in a freezer?
Relatedly, I estimated the Shrimp Welfare Projectâs Humane Slaughter Initiative is 43.5 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities. I would be curious about which changes to the parameters you would make to render the ratio lower than 1.
there are non-utilitarian moral arguments in favour of one group of philanthropic causes or another (prioritise helping fellow moral beings vs prioritise stopping fellow moral beings from actively causing harm) which feel a little less fuzzy but arenât any less contentious.
Why should one stop at the level of helping people in low income countries (via global health and development interventions)? Family and friends are closer to us, and helping strangers in far away countries is way more contentious than helping family and friends. Does this mean Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna (the funders of Open Philanthropy) should direct most of their resources to helping their families and friends? It is their money, so they decide, but I am glad they are using the money more cost-effectively.
I guess there are sound reasons why people could conclude that AW causes funded by OP were universally more effective than GHW ones or vice versa, but those appear to come more from strong philosophical positions (meat eater problems or disagreement with the moral relevance of animals) than evidence and measurement.
One does not need to worry about the meat eater problem to think the best animal welfare interventions are way more cost-effective than the best in global health and development. Neglecting that problem, I estimated corporate campaigns for chicken welfare are 1.51 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities, and Shrimp Welfare Projectâs Humane Slaughter Initiative is 43.5 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities.
Thanks for the response Vasco and apologies for the tardy reply :)
The necessity of making funding decisions means interventions in animal welfare and global health and development are compared at least implicitly. I think it is better to make them explicit for reasoning transparency, and having discussions which could eventually lead to better decisions. Saying there is too much uncertainty, and there is nothing we can do will not move things forward.
I agree on the first part. But it appears OP is perfectly transparent about their reasoning. They acknowledge that the level of uncertainty permits differences of opinion, that they believe a portfolio allocation approach incorporating different views on utilities and moral priorities and risk tolerance is better than adopting a single set of weights and fanatically optimising for them, and that the implicit moral weights are therefore a residual resulting from preference heterogenity of people whose decision making OP/âDustin/âCari value rather than an unjustifiable knowledge claim about the absolute intensity of animalsâ experiences which others must prove wrong if they are to consider allocating budget in any other way.
It is, of course, perfectly reasonable to disagree with any/âall individuals in OPâs preferences and the net result of that funding allocation, and there are many individual funding decisions OP have made which can be improved upon (including for relatively non-contentious reasons like âthey didnât achieve their aimsâ). But I donât tend to think that polemical arguments with suspicious convergence like âdonating to most things in cause area X is many times more effective than everything in cause area Yâ are particularly helpful in moving things forward, particularly when theyâre based not on spotting a glaring error or possible conflict of interest but upon a preference for the moral weights proposed by another organization OP are certainly aware of.
What do you think about humane slaughter interventions, such as the electrical stunning interventions promoted by the Centre for Aquaculture Progress? âMost sea bream and sea bass today are killed by being immersed in an ice slurry, a process which is not considered acceptable by the World Organisation for Animal Healthâ. âElectrical stunning reliably renders fish unconscious in less than one second, reducing their sufferingâ. Rough analogy, but a human dying in an electric chair suffers less than one dying in a freezer?
Honestly, I have no idea whether it would be more uncomfortable to die on an electric chair or in a freezer, and Iâm actually pretty familiar with the experience of human discomfort and descriptions of electrical shocks and hypothermia written from human perspectives. Iâm not volunteering to test it experimentally either! Needless to say I have even less knowledge about the experience of a cold blooded, water dwelling creature with completely different physiology and nervous system and plausibly no conscious experience at all
A consequence of this is that I donât think transferring all the money currently spent on eradicating malaria to funding campaigns of indeterminate efficacy to promote an alternative slaughter method which has an indeterminate impact on the final moments of fish can be stated with a high degree of certainty to be a net positive use of resources.
Relatedly, I estimated the Shrimp Welfare Projectâs Humane Slaughter Initiative is 43.5 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities. I would be curious about which changes to the parameters you would make to render the ration lower than 1.
This is a good question, and my honest answer is probably all of them, and the fundamental premise. Iâve discussed how lobbying organizationsâ funding isnât well measured at the margin and doesnât scale well in my previous post, I donât think the evidence base for ice slurry being a particularly painful slaughter method is particularly robust,[1] I donât think RPâs numbers or your upward revisions of the pain scales they use are particularly authoritative, and above all Iâm not sure itâs appropriate to use DALYs to trade human lives for thousand-point-scale estimates of the fleeting suffering of organisms where there isnât even a scientific consensus they have any conscious experience at all. Titotalâs post does a much better job than I could of explaining how easily it is to end up with orders of magnitude difference in outcomes even if one accepts the basic premises, and thereâs no particular reason to believe that premises like âresearchers have made some observations about aversion to what is assumed to be pain stimuli amidst an absence of evidence of other traits associated with consciousness, and attached a number to itâ are robust.
For related reasons, I donât think fanaticism is the best approach to budget allocation.
One does not need to worry about the meat eater problem to think the best animal welfare interventions are way more cost-effective than the best in global health and development. Neglecting that problem, I estimated corporate campaigns for chicken welfare are 1.51 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities, and Shrimp Welfare Projectâs Humane Slaughter Initiative is 43.5 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities.
Thereâs a reason why I used the word universal. Yes, it is entirely reasonable to believe that a couple of causes from one area are clearly and obviously better than the best known in another area, though shrimp welfare certainly isnât the one Iâd pick. But thatâs not the framing of the debate (which is the debate weekâs, not yours specifically) is on Cause Area X vs Cause Area Y, not âis Charity Z the most effective charity overallâ.
And if I did believe your numbers were a fairly accurate representation of reality and that fanaticism was better for budget allocation than a portfolio strategy, Iâd be concerned that chicken charities were using money specifically allocated to AW despite being ~28x worse than shrimp,[2] Thereâs more money in the GHW buckets, but the chicken â shrimp reallocation decision is more easily made.
though Iâll happily concede itâs a longer process than electrical stunning
Isnât this pretty key? If âElectrical stunning reliably renders fish unconscious in less than one secondâ as Vasco says, I donât see how you can get much better than that in terms of humane slaughter.
Or are you saying that electrical stunning is plausibly so bad even in that split second so as to make it potentially worse than a much slower death from freezing?
Itâs well within the bounds of possibility the electric shock is excruciating and the cold numbing, yes. Or indeed that theyâre both neutral, compared with slaughter methods that produce clear physiological stress indicators like asyphxiation in carbon-dioxide rich water. or that theyâre different for different types of water dwelling species depending on their natural hardiness to icy water, which also seems to be a popular theory. Rightly or wrongly, ice cold slurry is sometimes recommended as the humane option, although obviously the fish farming industry is more concerned with its ability to preserve the fish marginally better than kiliing prior to insertion into the slurry...
I was trying to question you on the duration aspect specifically. If electric shock lasts a split second is it really credible that it could be worse than a slow death through some other method?
If the slow death involves no pain, of course itâs credible. (The electric shock is, incidentally, generally insufficient to kill. They generally solve the problem of the fish reviving with immersion in ice slurry....). Itâs also credible that neither are remotely as painful as a two week malaria infection or a few years of malaria infection which is (much of) what sits on the other side of the trade here.
This is less clear for shrimp, though. I donât know if they find the cold painful at all, and it might sedate them or even render them unconscious. But I imagine that takes time, and theyâre being crushed by each other and ice with ice slurry.
Thanks for the comment, David.
The necessity of making funding decisions means interventions in animal welfare and global health and development are compared at least implicitly. I think it is better to make them explicit for reasoning transparency, and having discussions which could eventually lead to better decisions. Saying there is too much uncertainty, and there is nothing we can do will not move things forward.
What do you think about humane slaughter interventions, such as the electrical stunning interventions promoted by the Centre for Aquaculture Progress? âMost sea bream and sea bass today are killed by being immersed in an ice slurry, a process which is not considered acceptable by the World Organisation for Animal Healthâ. âElectrical stunning reliably renders fish unconscious in less than one second, reducing their sufferingâ. Rough analogy, but a human dying in an electric chair suffers less than one dying in a freezer?
Relatedly, I estimated the Shrimp Welfare Projectâs Humane Slaughter Initiative is 43.5 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities. I would be curious about which changes to the parameters you would make to render the ratio lower than 1.
Why should one stop at the level of helping people in low income countries (via global health and development interventions)? Family and friends are closer to us, and helping strangers in far away countries is way more contentious than helping family and friends. Does this mean Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna (the funders of Open Philanthropy) should direct most of their resources to helping their families and friends? It is their money, so they decide, but I am glad they are using the money more cost-effectively.
One does not need to worry about the meat eater problem to think the best animal welfare interventions are way more cost-effective than the best in global health and development. Neglecting that problem, I estimated corporate campaigns for chicken welfare are 1.51 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities, and Shrimp Welfare Projectâs Humane Slaughter Initiative is 43.5 k times as cost-effective as GiveWellâs top charities.
Thanks for the response Vasco and apologies for the tardy reply :)
I agree on the first part. But it appears OP is perfectly transparent about their reasoning. They acknowledge that the level of uncertainty permits differences of opinion, that they believe a portfolio allocation approach incorporating different views on utilities and moral priorities and risk tolerance is better than adopting a single set of weights and fanatically optimising for them, and that the implicit moral weights are therefore a residual resulting from preference heterogenity of people whose decision making OP/âDustin/âCari value rather than an unjustifiable knowledge claim about the absolute intensity of animalsâ experiences which others must prove wrong if they are to consider allocating budget in any other way.
It is, of course, perfectly reasonable to disagree with any/âall individuals in OPâs preferences and the net result of that funding allocation, and there are many individual funding decisions OP have made which can be improved upon (including for relatively non-contentious reasons like âthey didnât achieve their aimsâ). But I donât tend to think that polemical arguments with suspicious convergence like âdonating to most things in cause area X is many times more effective than everything in cause area Yâ are particularly helpful in moving things forward, particularly when theyâre based not on spotting a glaring error or possible conflict of interest but upon a preference for the moral weights proposed by another organization OP are certainly aware of.
Honestly, I have no idea whether it would be more uncomfortable to die on an electric chair or in a freezer, and Iâm actually pretty familiar with the experience of human discomfort and descriptions of electrical shocks and hypothermia written from human perspectives. Iâm not volunteering to test it experimentally either! Needless to say I have even less knowledge about the experience of a cold blooded, water dwelling creature with completely different physiology and nervous system and plausibly no conscious experience at all
A consequence of this is that I donât think transferring all the money currently spent on eradicating malaria to funding campaigns of indeterminate efficacy to promote an alternative slaughter method which has an indeterminate impact on the final moments of fish can be stated with a high degree of certainty to be a net positive use of resources.
This is a good question, and my honest answer is probably all of them, and the fundamental premise. Iâve discussed how lobbying organizationsâ funding isnât well measured at the margin and doesnât scale well in my previous post, I donât think the evidence base for ice slurry being a particularly painful slaughter method is particularly robust,[1] I donât think RPâs numbers or your upward revisions of the pain scales they use are particularly authoritative, and above all Iâm not sure itâs appropriate to use DALYs to trade human lives for thousand-point-scale estimates of the fleeting suffering of organisms where there isnât even a scientific consensus they have any conscious experience at all. Titotalâs post does a much better job than I could of explaining how easily it is to end up with orders of magnitude difference in outcomes even if one accepts the basic premises, and thereâs no particular reason to believe that premises like âresearchers have made some observations about aversion to what is assumed to be pain stimuli amidst an absence of evidence of other traits associated with consciousness, and attached a number to itâ are robust.
For related reasons, I donât think fanaticism is the best approach to budget allocation.
Thereâs a reason why I used the word universal. Yes, it is entirely reasonable to believe that a couple of causes from one area are clearly and obviously better than the best known in another area, though shrimp welfare certainly isnât the one Iâd pick. But thatâs not the framing of the debate (which is the debate weekâs, not yours specifically) is on Cause Area X vs Cause Area Y, not âis Charity Z the most effective charity overallâ.
And if I did believe your numbers were a fairly accurate representation of reality and that fanaticism was better for budget allocation than a portfolio strategy, Iâd be concerned that chicken charities were using money specifically allocated to AW despite being ~28x worse than shrimp,[2] Thereâs more money in the GHW buckets, but the chicken â shrimp reallocation decision is more easily made.
though Iâll happily concede itâs a longer process than electrical stunning
though personally Iâd attach higher confidence to the chicken campaigns being significantly net positive...
Thanks for elaborating, David. Strongly upvoted.
Isnât this pretty key? If âElectrical stunning reliably renders fish unconscious in less than one secondâ as Vasco says, I donât see how you can get much better than that in terms of humane slaughter.
Or are you saying that electrical stunning is plausibly so bad even in that split second so as to make it potentially worse than a much slower death from freezing?
Itâs well within the bounds of possibility the electric shock is excruciating and the cold numbing, yes. Or indeed that theyâre both neutral, compared with slaughter methods that produce clear physiological stress indicators like asyphxiation in carbon-dioxide rich water. or that theyâre different for different types of water dwelling species depending on their natural hardiness to icy water, which also seems to be a popular theory. Rightly or wrongly, ice cold slurry is sometimes recommended as the humane option, although obviously the fish farming industry is more concerned with its ability to preserve the fish marginally better than kiliing prior to insertion into the slurry...
I was trying to question you on the duration aspect specifically. If electric shock lasts a split second is it really credible that it could be worse than a slow death through some other method?
If the slow death involves no pain, of course itâs credible. (The electric shock is, incidentally, generally insufficient to kill. They generally solve the problem of the fish reviving with immersion in ice slurry....). Itâs also credible that neither are remotely as painful as a two week malaria infection or a few years of malaria infection which is (much of) what sits on the other side of the trade here.
My understanding from conversation with SWP is that for shrimp, the electric stunning also just kills the shrimp, and itâs all over very quickly.
It might be different for fish.
Conditional on fish actually being able to feel pain, it seems a bit far-fetched to me that a slow death in ice wouldnât be painful.
This is less clear for shrimp, though. I donât know if they find the cold painful at all, and it might sedate them or even render them unconscious. But I imagine that takes time, and theyâre being crushed by each other and ice with ice slurry.