I’m also leaning towards thinking of the movement’s objectives in terms of “reducing as much animal suffering as possible” rather than “ending factory farming”. That said, I’m more hesitant about what you draw from this distinction, concerning the more or less reasonable levels of ambition we might want to aim for.
When I hear animal sanctuary managers criticize effective altruism and justify their appeals for donations by explaining that “each one counts”, I’m hardly convinced: sure, every animal saved is a victory, but is it really the best we can do with these donations? It seems doubtful, given the derisory impact compared to the scale of the problem.
I find myself raising a similar objection here to the question of how ambitious we should be. Definitely, “If only 30% of the companies fail to meet their cage-free goals because of our work, instead of 60%, that is a win to celebrate.”, but is that really the best we can do with the money we spend? Maybe it is, yes. But the low impact relative to the scale of the problem still makes me wonder if we can’t do better than that, by looking for other ideas for even more cost-effective interventions, including those directed towards a longer-term impact, which seek to take us towards a society where we’ve reduced suffering so much that there’s no more factory farming (or even no more farming at all, or where we actively seek to take animals’ preferences into account beyond the simple avoidance of suffering). And it seems to me that this questioning stems from the very principles of EA: to seek an ambitious impact, without stopping at what we’ve already tried so far, even if it didn’t seem so bad.
The harsh reality for funders and project leaders is that it’s excruciatingly difficult to predict what might have the greatest impact in reducing suffering, even if only on the scale of a few decades. Could redirecting all the money devoted to corporate campaigns towards a patient effort of cultural influence through elite education and lobbying to spread antispeciesist values reduce suffering much more dramatically on the scale of a few decades, with greater cost-effectiveness? The uncertainty is so large that I have the impression that we’re tipping over into a debate of confronting more or less optimistic intuitions, in which it’s really difficult to reach firm conclusions.
Therefore, I find it hard to be convinced by the passage where you emphasize your doubts about interventions aimed at long-term abolition (“The hope of ending factory farming is sold via specific interventions or combinations of interventions. People in the movement then fundraise and work on those interventions, which I think are often a poor use of resources compared to other interventions.”). It seems to me that one could say something quite similar based on the same uncertainties: the hope of reducing suffering in the short term is sold via specific interventions or combinations of interventions. People in the movement then fundraise and work on those interventions, which may be a poor use of resources compared to other interventions (which aim to reduce suffering much more drastically, but over a longer period of time).
Since in the end, we still have to choose which interventions to fund or engage in, I believe it’s best to recognize that these choices are based on intuitions, and to make them explicit (while trying to assess their relevance): do I have the intuition to be risk-averse and focus on interventions whose impact can be measured in the short term? Or am I prepared to risk allocating fewer resources to avoiding hours of intense suffering for today’s hens, in order to fund projects that aim to reduce suffering much more drastically, but on a century-long scale, and with an expected value that becomes absurd to calculate, as it can both hit the ceiling or turn out to be negative? Do I have a hunch that we should choose our battles using RP’s moral weights, or am I having trouble with the postulates on which their calculations are based? Etc.
In this respect, I find it interesting to move forward in this debate by asking:
- How each of us goes about approximating the probability of finding interventions that would be so effective in reducing suffering as to bring about the end of factory farming in, say, 50 years’ time?
- How does one go about assessing what does or does not constitute a “poor use of resources”?
I’m also leaning towards thinking of the movement’s objectives in terms of “reducing as much animal suffering as possible” rather than “ending factory farming”. That said, I’m more hesitant about what you draw from this distinction, concerning the more or less reasonable levels of ambition we might want to aim for.
When I hear animal sanctuary managers criticize effective altruism and justify their appeals for donations by explaining that “each one counts”, I’m hardly convinced: sure, every animal saved is a victory, but is it really the best we can do with these donations? It seems doubtful, given the derisory impact compared to the scale of the problem.
I find myself raising a similar objection here to the question of how ambitious we should be. Definitely, “If only 30% of the companies fail to meet their cage-free goals because of our work, instead of 60%, that is a win to celebrate.”, but is that really the best we can do with the money we spend? Maybe it is, yes. But the low impact relative to the scale of the problem still makes me wonder if we can’t do better than that, by looking for other ideas for even more cost-effective interventions, including those directed towards a longer-term impact, which seek to take us towards a society where we’ve reduced suffering so much that there’s no more factory farming (or even no more farming at all, or where we actively seek to take animals’ preferences into account beyond the simple avoidance of suffering). And it seems to me that this questioning stems from the very principles of EA: to seek an ambitious impact, without stopping at what we’ve already tried so far, even if it didn’t seem so bad.
The harsh reality for funders and project leaders is that it’s excruciatingly difficult to predict what might have the greatest impact in reducing suffering, even if only on the scale of a few decades. Could redirecting all the money devoted to corporate campaigns towards a patient effort of cultural influence through elite education and lobbying to spread antispeciesist values reduce suffering much more dramatically on the scale of a few decades, with greater cost-effectiveness? The uncertainty is so large that I have the impression that we’re tipping over into a debate of confronting more or less optimistic intuitions, in which it’s really difficult to reach firm conclusions.
Therefore, I find it hard to be convinced by the passage where you emphasize your doubts about interventions aimed at long-term abolition (“The hope of ending factory farming is sold via specific interventions or combinations of interventions. People in the movement then fundraise and work on those interventions, which I think are often a poor use of resources compared to other interventions.”). It seems to me that one could say something quite similar based on the same uncertainties: the hope of reducing suffering in the short term is sold via specific interventions or combinations of interventions. People in the movement then fundraise and work on those interventions, which may be a poor use of resources compared to other interventions (which aim to reduce suffering much more drastically, but over a longer period of time).
Since in the end, we still have to choose which interventions to fund or engage in, I believe it’s best to recognize that these choices are based on intuitions, and to make them explicit (while trying to assess their relevance): do I have the intuition to be risk-averse and focus on interventions whose impact can be measured in the short term? Or am I prepared to risk allocating fewer resources to avoiding hours of intense suffering for today’s hens, in order to fund projects that aim to reduce suffering much more drastically, but on a century-long scale, and with an expected value that becomes absurd to calculate, as it can both hit the ceiling or turn out to be negative? Do I have a hunch that we should choose our battles using RP’s moral weights, or am I having trouble with the postulates on which their calculations are based? Etc.
In this respect, I find it interesting to move forward in this debate by asking:
- How each of us goes about approximating the probability of finding interventions that would be so effective in reducing suffering as to bring about the end of factory farming in, say, 50 years’ time?
- How does one go about assessing what does or does not constitute a “poor use of resources”?