Carla_Fin

Karma: −6

Carla_Fin 17 May 2016 13:39 UTC
2 points
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in reply to: MichaelDickens’s comment on: GiveWell’s Charity Recommendations Require Taking a Controversial Stance on Population Ethics
Even so, the suffering of birth, death and perhaps of being an inarticulate infant can be high enough to make it net-negative for the primary individual. It can even be high enough to outweigh 35 average human life-years if it is severe enough and/or the average experience value of one life-year is low enough or negative.

Even if this isn’t true for the majority, it can still be true for the average, e.g. if 1% of life-years contain unusual suffering 100 times as severe as 1 life-year is good.

Carla_Fin 27 Apr 2016 12:18 UTC
−4 points
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in reply to: kokotajlod’s comment on: Why Poverty?

Standards of living even in Saudi Arabia

I’m sure the people whose skin is whipped to bloody shreds are very happy that their tormentors enjoy a high GDP.

A new, fiery religion could appear.

Most religions have historical roots, which are culturally perpetuated. Perhaps new cults can emerge, one might also fear the risk of new brainwashing technology. But why speculate about new religious fundamentalism when the old ones are alive and kicking?

odds <1% of sweeping cultural change

No one said anything about odds this low. They are far higher.

P.S.: A big fuck you to the people who downvoted my comment below visibility AFTER I pointed out the danger of stifling criticism in the name of PC; people like you are the reason why those girls in Rotherham could get raped without their molestors having to fear punishment.

Carla_Fin 26 Apr 2016 7:46 UTC
−3 points
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in reply to: kbog’s comment on: The Poor Meat Investor Problem

it’s in the best interests of the children who are being sent to school.

No, but it makes them more useful for economic exploitation by the rich and the politicians in their pockets.

Pretending it’s for the children’s own good just sounds nicer.

Carla_Fin 26 Apr 2016 5:42 UTC
−6 points
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in reply to: Gleb_T’s comment on: Why Poverty?
It doesn’t address the possibility of differential cultural reproduction.

Specifically, it doesn’t address that some religious cultures may retain relatively higher reproduction rates even as mortality falls, without sufficient cultural attrition rates (1) to offset the difference.

If Islamic fundamentalism reproduces faster than other cultures, and the pro-immigration crowd combined with the PC police succeed in stifling criticism, the resulting world will be a global (2) melting pot ruled by suffering-maximizing Shariah law. That’s a worse existential risk than pandemics or climate change; in fact it would be worse than human extinction.

EA will not do any good without addressing the problem of religious fundamentalism and the differential growth of morally inferior culture.

(1) The punishment for apostasy under Islam is death. (2) We already have an Islamic rape epidemic in Europe now, see Rotherham and Cologne.

Carla_Fin 25 Apr 2016 18:45 UTC
−2 points
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on: Why Poverty?
Eliminating poverty only works if poor people don’t exist. If you want to save lives, as is often said, then eliminating poverty implies preventing reproduction. Otherwise, standard malthusian logic applies.

How are you going to make sure their reproduction will be below replacement? What guarantee do you have that there are no natalist religious cultures which won’t undergo such a fertility transition with increasing wealth? It seems those cultures are among the worst for welfare, e.g. Islam in its various anti-liberty and pro-suffering variations.

Carla_Fin 8 Mar 2016 9:04 UTC
1 point
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in reply to: tjmather’s comment on: The Meat Eater Problem: Developing an EA Response
To the people who downvote us here (or perhaps just one guy with 2 accounts):

Feel free to provide actual constructive criticism. Or solve the problem of global poverty, child mortality, and animal suffering on your own.

Carla_Fin 7 Mar 2016 23:30 UTC
0 points
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in reply to: MichaelDickens’s comment on: The Meat Eater Problem: Developing an EA Response
There could also be some overlap in helping developing countries reduce their birth rates, e.g. contracepitve availability, young female education, etc. This could increase per capita gdp, decrease child mortality and improve other metrics, without increasing total meat consumption exponentially. Perhaps this could be more of a focus area in EA.

Carla_Fin 2 Mar 2016 1:15 UTC
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in reply to: CarlShulman’s comment on: Why don’t many effective altruists work on natural resource scarcity?
.

Carla_Fin 1 Mar 2016 3:27 UTC
3 points
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in reply to: RyanCarey’s comment on: The Meat Eater Problem: Developing an EA Response

It’s also generally agrees that there’s not much reason to expect that there to be a lot of suffering animals in the long run, compared to the amount of animal flourishing, if we’re able to travel to new planets, make synthetic meats, create awesome entertainment and scientific experiments without their use, et cetera.

This is not a consensus. Most people don’t care about suffering in nature or equivalent ecosystems. There is also no consensus that we should outlaw animal use even if we invent fully functional substitutes.

I personally think it’s naive to expect more flourishing than suffering even in humans. Just because a culture is technologically advanced doesn’t mean they won’t torture the defenseless on a large scale. I expect this to happen to humans and posthumans frequently. There is nothing in the universe that will prevent this.

Carla_Fin 29 Feb 2016 23:50 UTC
2 points
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in reply to: turchin’s comment on: The Meat Eater Problem: Developing an EA Response
That would increase animal suffering. We want to decrease it.

Carla_Fin 17 Jan 2016 2:34 UTC
1 point
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in reply to: Owen Cotton-Barratt’s comment on: EA Interview Series, January 2016: Perumal Gandhi, Cofounder of Muufri
I don’t mean to dismiss Muufri, just put the true counterfactual in perspective. If there is a potential market for these products, replaceability is a realistic expectation.

I don’t think this dynamic applies to everything equally. I would expect it to apply more for those actions that exist in a market equilibrium, like supplying a substitute for an existing good at a given price. Maybe the same is true for donations, selective consumption, undercover investigations or political activism, but that seems less obvious to me.

Carla_Fin 16 Jan 2016 16:00 UTC
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in reply to: tjmather’s comment on: EA Interview Series, January 2016: Perumal Gandhi, Cofounder of Muufri
I’m not sure this is true in the long run, but perhaps it helps speed the innovation up.

Carla_Fin 16 Jan 2016 3:08 UTC
0 points
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on: EA Interview Series, January 2016: Perumal Gandhi, Cofounder of Muufri
Animal products without animals is a great idea.

But if it is profitable, someone will do it for-profit anyway. If it is not profitable, these products will fail in the long run. Perhaps altruistic funding can speed this process up, but it won’t make a difference in whether or not these products will have a market in the long run.

Maybe an alternative is to lobby for higher animal welfare standards, lower subsidies of animal products, and undercover investigations to unveil cruelty and lawbreaking in the industry. All of these would work even if the substitute products don’t take off, but they also have the implicit effect of supporting the substitutes indirectly by making animal exploitation more expensive.