Daniela R. Waldhorn

Welfare con­sid­er­a­tions for farmed shrimp

Shrimp: The an­i­mals most com­monly used and kil­led for food production

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 23 Jun 2022 18:01 UTC

  8 points

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  on: Who’s hiring? (May-Septem­ber 2022)

  Rethink Priorities is incubating a new organization–temporarily called the Insect Welfare Project–and we are looking for an Executive Director! This person will initially join us at Rethink Priorities while working to build the project into a successful independent organization.

  This is a pivotal decade for the insect farming industry: consumer attitudes are in flux, regulations are being considered and written for the first time, and new factories are being designed and built. Now is the best time we might ever have to influence this sector and help animals farmed and harmed in the trillions.

  If you’re interested in this opportunity, please apply by July 17, 2022. Otherwise, we greatly appreciate your help in sharing this open position with anyone in your network you think would be a good fit. Thanks!

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 25 Feb 2021 19:14 UTC

  28 points

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  in reply to: Ula Zarosa’s comment on: AMA: Lewis Bol­lard, Open Philanthropy

  Hi Ula! I agree with you. I myself stopped working directly as an animal advocate after being mobbed, harassed, and listening to regular discriminatory comments for being a woman, an immigrant, and because of my origin. I’ve seen so many activists going through the same.

  In my case, the continued support of other advocates, especially of the Encompass community (www.encompassmovement.org), has been invaluable. I highly recommend it.

  Second, I also believe that it’s time to stop normalizing activists’ mistreatment and discriminatory practices, especially in organizations where there is evidence that these issues are structural. In this regard, it’s very disappointing that organizations with ongoing and severe management and leadership problems continue to receive large grants or support from the EA community.

  Third, I think organizations should develop active policies to prevent these situations from happening in the very first place. We should not have more advocates burning out or leaving the movement to take this issue seriously.

  I’m glad that you’re also concerned about this problem, and I’d be happy to talk about this further with you :). I’m also open to discussing it with Lewis– if he considers it appropriate.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 25 Feb 2021 16:51 UTC

  17 points

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  in reply to: Ula Zarosa’s comment on: AMA: Lewis Bol­lard, Open Philanthropy

  Thanks for pointing this out, Ula. I’m aware that several activists in other organizations have also suffered similar situations, along with derogatory comments because of their origin and gender.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 25 Feb 2021 10:01 UTC

  51 points

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  on: AMA: Lewis Bol­lard, Open Philanthropy

  Hey Lewis!

  1. What kind of work would you like to see done for invertebrates?

  2. What kind of work would you like to see done for animals living in the wild?

  3. Are there key research questions that you think would contribute to advance these two areas’ tractability?

  Thanks!

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 8 Apr 2020 14:44 UTC

  5 points

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  in reply to: Tobias_Baumann’s comment on: Coron­avirus and non-hu­mans: How is the pan­demic af­fect­ing an­i­mals used for hu­man con­sump­tion?

  Hi Tobias!

  Thanks for commenting. That’s a very interesting question. Probably, after the pandemic, people may be more concerned about safer and healthier food, and more open to messages about public costs and other problems associated with animal farming. But for now, this is just a hypothesis that should be empirically tested, as Peter says.

  However, I disagree with the idea that coronavirus doesn’t have anything to do with animal farming. There is extensive evidence about how factory farms provide an ideal breeding ground for highly pathogenic viruses, worsen by the abusive use of antibiotics. Researchers Cynthia Schuck and Wladimir Alonso have recently published a report about this issue available here.

Coron­avirus and non-hu­mans: How is the pan­demic af­fect­ing an­i­mals used for hu­man con­sump­tion?

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 13 Feb 2020 10:16 UTC

  1 point

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  in reply to: adamShimi’s comment on: Snails used for hu­man con­sump­tion: The case of meat and slime

  Interesting, thank you!

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 12 Feb 2020 12:20 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: adamShimi’s comment on: Snails used for hu­man con­sump­tion: The case of meat and slime

  Thanks for your comment, adamShimi! Do you have a sense of the profile of people that find eating snails disgusting? I wonder if it’s a generational issue, for example. In Spain, eating snails now seems to be much more prevalent among older generations than among the youngest population.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 7 Feb 2020 16:04 UTC

  31 points

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  in reply to: Julia_Wise’s comment on: Snails used for hu­man con­sump­tion: The case of meat and slime

  Hey Julia! I partially address that point in the section that Linch indicated. As you say, whether snails have a capacity for valenced experience is still uncertain. When compared to bivalves, snails have more diverse and specialized sensory organs. As snails are motile and active foragers, they display a wider range of behaviors, and that is reflected in greater neural complexity. For instance, snails show nociceptive responses, like avoidance behavior in response to high temperatures (not surprisingly, several sources that provide instructions for cooking snails mention the attempts of snails to escape boiling water). However, relatively little is known about the anatomical organization and actual functions of most neurons in their ganglionic regions.
  I must admit that I haven’t investigated any bivalves in detail. Still, for what I know, the case for snail sentience is much better than the evidence for bivalve sentience.

Snails used for hu­man con­sump­tion: The case of meat and slime

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 8 Jan 2020 20:58 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: utilitarian01’s comment on: Opinion: Es­ti­mat­ing In­ver­te­brate Sentience

  Hi!

  Although the possession of nociceptors is perhaps some evidence of a capacity to feel pain, it is certainly not by itself “a good indicator” of that capacity. If nociceptors are not connected to centralized information-processing structures, these neurons could trigger reflexive reactions (i.e., similar to spinally mediated responses in mammals), but that would not imply that the nociceptive input is consciously perceived (in humans, see Becker et al., 2012; Dubin & Patapoutian, 2010). If we understand consciousness as suitably integrated information (Oizumi et al., 2014), the projections of nociceptors to integrative information-processing structures is a crucial aspect to examine when judging the probability that a nonhuman individual is conscious.

  In the case of C. elegans, unlike other invertebrates, they do not seem to have a specific neural region for the processing of spatial information and organization of movement. In other words, movement and stimuli discrimination do not appear to be integrated in a manner sufficiently similar to the vertebrate midbrain (see Altun & Hall, 2011; Kato et al., 2015).

  However, it should be noted that some noxious stimuli reactions have been identified in C. elegans, specifically, physiological responses to nociception and moving away from a noxious stimulus. However, heat-evoked escape responses in these animals, for example, are considered highly stereotypical, and a reflexive reaction (Leung et al., 2016).

  Finally, when I used the term “simple” [nociceptive behaviors] here I specifically meant: (i) nociceptive responses can be identified, but they do not necessarily account for noxious stimulus intensity and direction, (ii) absence or insufficient indicators of ‘long-term’ learning and memory, and (iii) absence or insufficient indicators of motivational tradeoffs. Given our findings (summarized here), C. elegans seem to mostly display simple nociceptive responses.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 13 Dec 2019 16:34 UTC

  12 points

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  in reply to: Kirsten’s comment on: We’re Re­think Pri­ori­ties. AMA.

  I applied to RP when I decided to make an important change in my career. If RP hadn’t hired me, I’d have kept trying it at different EA organizations, maybe as an intern. Yet, I would likely have ended up working in a management position at a local NGO.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 13 Dec 2019 16:06 UTC

  10 points

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  in reply to: MichaelStJules’s comment on: We’re Re­think Pri­ori­ties. AMA.

  Yes, now I’m more careful while walking outside.
  After our research on invertebrates, I also placed a net in some windows at home, and I purposefully keep them closed as long as possible to prevent any flying insects from visiting us and being “welcomed” by my cats.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 13 Dec 2019 16:03 UTC

  14 points

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  in reply to: Ben_West’s comment on: We’re Re­think Pri­ori­ties. AMA.

  I do think that the chances of bivalves being sentient are quite low. However, I do not eat them because I’m already used to a plant-based diet, and given our uncertainty, I adhere to the precautionary principle in this case.

  In general, I would not recommend consuming marine invertebrates produced in countries where trawling is not banned, given its impact on other aquatic animals for whom there is a high probability that they are sentient (i.e., fish and other vertebrates).

  Still, I’m unsure about the consequences of promoting bivalve consumption, even if they are farmed. I’m concerned about how some people might interpret such a message –e.g., they may assume, without much thought, that consuming other more complex invertebrates (e.g., shrimps) is equivalent.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 13 Dec 2019 15:34 UTC

  13 points

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  in reply to: Ben_West’s comment on: We’re Re­think Pri­ori­ties. AMA.

  I agree with Jason. Additionally, I probably wouldn’t be a researcher if I didn’t work for an organization like RP because of operational costs, security/​risk, and well-being reasons. But more importantly, since I’m at an early stage of my career as a researcher, if I worked independently, I wouldn’t count on the support of my team and researchers with more experience. That would make it very difficult for me to improve and develop professionally as a researcher.

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 25 Nov 2019 21:11 UTC

  3 points

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  in reply to: mativazquez’s comment on: Next Steps in In­ver­te­brate Welfare, Part 2: Pos­si­ble Interventions

  ¡Gracias por tu interés y tu colaboración, Mati!

  Thank you for your interest and collaboration, Mati!

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 25 Nov 2019 21:09 UTC

  7 points

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  in reply to: Denkenberger’s comment on: Next Steps in In­ver­te­brate Welfare, Part 2: Pos­si­ble Interventions

  Thanks!

  Good question about repellants. Indeed, if food were the limiting factor, repellants would be much more effective. But in agricultural lands, crops constitute a superabundant source of potential food. In these landscapes, invertebrates like some insects or snails do not seem to be mainly limited by the amount of available food –instead, access to quality feed appears to be a matter of greater importance.

  Therefore, deterring insects typically move off on to a new crop, where they do not necessarily compete for food, and their populations can thrive. So it is unclear whether repellants will actually reduce populations of target invertebrates. That is why repellents are only used occasionally in crops. They work better as a part of a strategy that incorporates other forms of population control.
  

• Daniela R. Waldhorn 20 Nov 2019 21:24 UTC

  6 points

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  in reply to: Tobias_Baumann’s comment on: Next Steps in In­ver­te­brate Welfare, Part 3: Un­der­stand­ing At­ti­tudes and Pos­si­bil­ities

  Hi Tobias!
  

  Thanks for your interest and your stimulating feedback. In general, I think that people do not have an elaborated position about these issues. But we are typically resistant to ideas that conflict with our beliefs, and, as you say, if one rationalization does not work, in all probability, we will make up a new excuse in order to dismiss a “troubling” or “crazy” position.
  

  Unfortunately, there is no direct evidence about this specific effect in how we morally think about invertebrates. In fact, the psychological barriers here described are, in several cases, mere hypotheses based on existing knowledge. Thus, to what extent these psychological barriers operate, and the role of the radical flank effect and other mechanisms are issues that should be empirically addressed.
  

  I also share your impression that, in some contexts, we may have the chance to promote welfare measures for some invertebrates, like octopuses, crabs, or lobsters. Crustacean Compassion’s work in the UK is a good example in this regard. Surprisingly, some of their demands are shared by the Labour Party, and an animal welfare organization linked to the Conservative Party. I still wonder under what circumstances this is possible –(i) on behalf of which species and why (i.e., what factors make us more likely to consider some invertebrates rather than others), and (ii) what makes a society more suitable for such demands. Do you have any other suggestions in this regard?