Thanks for the comment! Very interesting points indeed!

While I do agree that non-utilitarian theories "don't say" as much as utilitarian theories about positive duties, high priority duties in particular, I partly disagree that non-utilitarian theories "can't say" much about positive duties or prioritisation.

Instruments like the golden rule or virtues like mercy and compassion may point to similar duties as "moderate" utilitarian theories point out.

To be honest, I was also very sympathetic to utilitarianism overall (saving drowning children from ponds - of course!), but recent “calculus” that point to (exclusive) massive shifts toward invertebrate welfare made me question whether this is a reasonable framework. As the authors of the Moral Weight Project rightly pointed out, they are just the messengers, these are just the results of applying utilitarianism. While I did find the project very insightful, my conclusion was that maybe utilitarianism needs to be questioned.   

Lastly, while I understand that utilitarianism takes “human nature” into utility calculus, I don’t think this explains the whole picture. As I tried to explain, this can only function as an “excuse” not a “reason” for action (or inaction). Under utilitarianism (with “human nature” adjustments), people might be “excused” for not dedicating their entire life for invertebrates, but alternative life or career choices of these people cannot be found “reasonable”. I think alternatives can be reasonable (at least equally reasonable as the option of dedication to invertebrate welfare), and these need not be excuses. But these reasons are not to be found in utilitarianism. 

Thank you Karolina for the detailed answer!

How often grantees pivot to more modest goals or different tactics after they realise that their initial goals are very hard to reach or their initial idea does not deliver results- after they receive their grants for certain high goals and specific plans in their application? How do you balance holding grantees accountable vs. providing them flexibility?   

Thanks for writing this. It has many interesting points. 

One thing I would like to point out which might be of help is that many processed eggs are in fact processed from lower quality shell eggs (cracked or very dirty ones). Since these are typically not suitable for sale on retail as shell eggs, they are used as a waste product by processors. 

This might update the impact of the intervention downwards (given that these are waste products whose substitution might impact fewer animals), but can also slightly update the possibility of change upwards due to consumer preference for alternatives (due to perceived quality concerns, rather than allergies - which can be a better leverage).

Hi there! 

I would say my Kafessiz Türkiye (Cage-free Turkey) cofounding experience followed this pattern, at least partially. Of course, these weren't the only reasons but I think things could have been different if funding schemes were different. As for Animal Advocacy Careers, I don't really have a senior position to talk authoritatively about this issue but my subjective view is that again, different decisions about hiring (and increasing size) might have happened if funding schemes were different. 

I guess AIM startup space might be a bit different since in AIM there is a significant "education" period that can teach founders to not to fall for "founder mistakes". Another  reason might be that AIM provide a good amount of seed funding that can provide a long runway - something that other organisations don't have.

Looking at this again, I guess my observations are mainly focused on animal welfare space - which is something that I should have mentioned in the post (thanks for this). It may be that GHD funding is not like this.  

But aside from that, the main argument of the post depends on the fact that most grants are annual or biannual which explains certain dynamics.   

Thanks! 

I definately agree there is a lot of room of improvement in animal ethics. Most animal welfare people are cool with being unconventional but I think this kind of misses the point which is that we might not currently have the right moral framework. 

I also think utilitarianism got "some" things right like extreme pain is really immoral, or one should be seeking efficiency (within reasonable limits) etc. But it remains weak and weird by itself, without any additional (and multiple) values and principles. 

Thank you @ASuchy  

Thanks for the comment!

And apologies for the late reply - I turned off the notifications after the debate week. 

I think the main argument I tried to put forward was more about the dependency of many organisations to one single major donor and the risks associated with this (and how it would make sense to mitigate this via more donations). And to be clear, I wasn’t criticising Open Philanthropy. I just think that given Open Philanthropy is a bit alone in the field, animal welfare is neglected in a unique way. If there were multiple donors that are equally major as Open Philanthropy, there wouldn’t be such fragility. But as far as I am aware, EAAWF and ACE do not have such funds and do not provide such large grants as of now. They are much smaller than the OP farm animal welfare program. 

I don’t think it would be likely that OP, ACE and EAAWF simultaneously decide to downscale, since OP has multiple causes while ACE and EAAWF have sole focus on animal welfare. So I don’t think having a bigger EAAWF or ACE would result in the same level of fragility, even if organisations still depend on major donors. The main difference would be that many organisations would rely on multiple major donors rather than one single major donor. 

By the way, I am less concerned with which avenue (funds or individual organisations) one should choose to donate. But my initial concern with the “individual” approach was that more individual donors spread more funds to more organisations which at the end would not help to mitigate this fragility if OP withdraws from animal welfare or significantly downscales. In theory, individual donors can also coordinate to channel their donations to fill in the gaps if such an event occurs, but in practice, I think funds would be more able to do this more efficiently. This is more of a practical issue which I don’t have super strong views about.

On the other hand, “funds vs. individual donors” is another debate where I strongly agree with you that more oversight of individual donors is very needed. As you mentioned, this depends mostly on the level of knowledge of the donors, but I can also add (in favour of the individual approach) that this also depends on the level of engagement of the donors. I don’t expect major funds with limited staff can engage with each of their grantees perfectly. I think individual donors can play a very important role in engaging with these organisations as “shareholders” (or grant managers) and hopefully improve their performance. Of course, donors can do that for funds to some degree as well.

To reply to the last paragraph: yes, I think this is a fair summary.

Thanks for the comment!

I am sorry to hear that. I hope you find the necessary funding for your efforts.

I agree that more fundraisers are needed. But unfortunately without more alternative funders, fundraisers might also fail to achieve their goals. Perhaps one short term improvement might be funders being more transparent about their expectaions and their plans so that grantees can adjust themselves to potential outcomes. Being more communicative might also help. Most grantees contact funders only on grant application periods which provides only limited feedback opportunities.