Here is the crosspost on the EA Forum. Rob preferred I shared it myself.

The critical question is whether shrimp or insects can support the kinds of negative states that make suffering severe, rather than merely possible.

I think suffering matters proportionally to its intensity. So I would not neglect mild suffering in principle, although it may not matter much in practice due to contributing little to total expected suffering.

In any case, I would agree the total expected welfare of farmed invertebrates may be tiny compared with that of humans due invertebrates' experiences having a very low intensity. For expected individual welfare per fully-healthy-animal-year proportional to "individual number of neurons"^"exponent", and "exponent" from 0.5 to 1.5, which I believe covers reasonable best guesses, I estimate that the expected total welfare of farmed shrimps ranges from -0.282 to -2.82*10^-7 times that of humans, and that of farmed black soldier fly (BSF) larvae and mealworms from -4.80*10^-4 to -6.23*10^-11 times that of humans. In addition, I calculate the Shrimp Welfare Project’s (SWP’s) Humane Slaughter Initiative (HSI) has increased the welfare of shrimps 0.00167 (= 2.06*10^5/0.0123) to 1.67 k (= 20.6/0.0123) times as cost-effectively as GiveWell's top charities increase the welfare of humans.

And even granting the usual EA filters—tractability, neglectedness, feasibility, and evidential robustness—the scale gradient from shrimp to insects (via agriculture-related deaths) is so steep that these filters don’t, by themselves, explain why the precautionary logic should settle on shrimp. All else equal, once you shift to a target that is thousands of times larger, an intervention could be far less effective [in terms of robustly increasing welfare in expectation] and still compete on expected impact.

I very much agree. Moreover, I do not even know whether electrically stunning farmed shrimps increases or decreases welfare due to effects on soil animals and microorganisms.

Are you thinking about humans as an aligned collective in the 1st paragraph of your comment? I agree all humans coordinating their actions together would have more power than other groups of organisms with their actual levels of coordination. However, such level of coordination among humans is not realistic. All 10^30 bacteria (see Table S1 of Bar-On et al. (2018)) coordinating their actions together would arguably also have more power than all humans with their actual level of coordination.

I agree it is good that no human has power over all humans. However, I still think one being dominating all others has a probability lower than 0.001 % over the next 10 years. I am open to bets against short AI timelines, or what they supposedly imply, up to 10 k$. Do you see any that we could make that is good for both of us under our own views?

Hi Guy. Elon Musk was not the only person responsible for the recent large cuts in foreign aid from the United States (US). In addition, I believe outcomes like human extinction are way less likely. I agree it makes sense to worry about concentration of power, but not about extreme outcomes like human extinction.

Thanks for sharing, James.

Thanks for the relevant post, Wladimir and Cynthia. I strongly upvoted it. Do you have any practical ideas about how to apply the Sentience Bargain framework to compare welfare across species? I would be curious to know your thoughts on Rethink Priorities' (RP's) research agenda on valuing impacts across species.

Thanks for the great post, Lukas. I strongly upvoted it. I also agree with your concluding thoughts and implications.

Thank you all for the very interesting discussion.

I think addressing the greatest sources of suffering is a promising approach to robustly increase welfare. However, I believe the focus should be on the greatest sources of suffering in the ecosystem, not in any given population, such that effects on non-target organisms can be neglected. Electrically stunning farmed shrimps arguably addresses one of the greatest sources of suffering of farmed shrimps, and the ratio between its effects on target and non-target organisms is much larger than for the vast majority of interventions, but I still do not know whether it increases or decreases welfare (even in expectation) due to potentially dominant effects on soil animals and microorganisms.

I expect the greatest sources of suffering in the ecosystem to be found in the organisms accounting for the most suffering in the ecosystem. However, I would say much more research on comparing welfare across species is needed to identify such organisms. I can see them being vertebrates, invertebrates, trees, or microorganisms.

I worry very specific unrealistic conditions will be needed to ensure the effects on non-target organisms can be neglected if it is not known which organisms account for the most suffering in the ecosystem. So I would prioritise research on comparing welfare across species over mapping sources of suffering in ecosystems.

Thanks, Zoë. I see funders are the ones deciding what to fund, and that you only provide advice if they so wish, as explained below. What if funders ask you for advice on which species to support? Do you base your advice on the welfare ranges presented in Bob's book? Have you considered recommending research on welfare comparisons across species to such funders, such as the projects in RP's research agenda on valuing impacts across species?

Q: Do Senterra Funders staff decide how funders make grant decisions?

A: No, each Senterra member maintains full autonomy over their grantmaking. Some Senterra members seek Senterra’s philanthropic advising, in which Senterra staff conduct research and make recommendations specific to the donor’s interests. Some Senterra members engage in collaborative grantmaking facilitated by Senterra staff. Ultimately, it’s up to each member to decide how and where to give.