Volume XII · The Essentials of Animal Ethics · chapter 11
Key Concepts in the Debate on the Importance of the Future
Before you read study layer, not part of the original text
Key concepts about the future: s-risks (astronomical suffering), how they differ from x-risks, seriousness as severity times probability, speciesism and substratism, and the classification of s-risks as incidental, agential, or natural, known or unknown.
In the future, new ways of making many beings suffer could appear, even for digital beings. The chapter explains the words that help us think about these dangers.
Just as speciesism discriminates by species, substratism would discriminate by the material a body is made of, such as carbon or silicon.
- P1 The future may contain astronomical suffering (s-risks), including that of nonhumans and nonbiological beings.
- P2 The seriousness of an s-risk is its severity multiplied by its probability.
- P3 Substratism, like speciesism, could produce suffering in astronomical quantities.
- C So we should consider animals because they are sentient, not because they are animals or living beings.
The chapter’s central argument in logical form. If the premises are true, the conclusion follows. To disagree, you have to show which premise is false.
They say “Only flesh-and-blood beings can truly suffer.”
Answer If sentient digital beings appear, disregarding them because they are made of a different material would be substratism, just as arbitrary as speciesism.
More objections and answers in Debunking objections.
Original text Luciano Carlos Cunha · Volume XII, p. 42 of the PDF edition · English translation
11.1. What are s-risks?
Today, an enormous number of animals suffer intensely, and in many cases in ways that did not exist in the past. Likewise, in the future new ways of harming beings on a massive scale may arise, on a scale astronomically larger than that of the suffering existing today. A key concept in this debate is that of 48:
- S-risks: risks that events will occur in the future resulting in suffering of enormous magnitude, exceeding all the suffering that has existed on Earth so far49.
11.2. Differences between s-risks and x-risks
are about risks of the annihilation of humanity. S-risks are about scenarios with astronomical suffering. There are s-risks that are not x-risks, since there are forms of suffering inflicted on nonhuman sentient beings that do not threaten humanity50.
11.3. How do we measure the seriousness of an s-risk?
The seriousness of an s-risk is measured by multiplying how bad the scenario would be by its probability of occurring (the result is its , or ED)51.
The following table shows some examples of s-risks.
11.4. Examples of s-risks
| Examples of s-risks | |
|---|---|
| Example | Explanation |
| An increase in animal exploitation (IX, ch. 1.8.1). | Examples: (1) Expanding it in scale (that is, affecting a larger number of sentient beings). (2) Making it qualitatively worse (that is, increasing the harms suffered by each animal). (3) Creating new ways in which it can take place. |
| An expansion of wild animal suffering (IX, ch. 1.8.2). | This may occur because of an increase in the number of animals on Earth or because of the intentional or accidental spread of life beyond it52. |
| The creation of new forms of sentience (IX, ch. 1.8.3). | One example would be the creation of nonbiological forms of sentience. Such beings, although sentient, might not have faces, nor move or scream. So it may be hard to feel empathy for them. It may also happen that a digital entity is sentient and we do not notice. Enormous numbers of these beings may come to exist in the future, since creating them for certain purposes could involve lower costs than creating biological sentient beings. |
11.5. The concepts of speciesism and substratism
Just as speciesism is discrimination based on the species to which someone belongs, substratism is discrimination based on the kind of substrate that makes up a being's body (for example, whether it is organic or non-organic). Just as is a form of (against those who do not belong to the human species), carbonism is a form of (against those who are not organic). Substratism, just like speciesism, may produce suffering in astronomical quantities in the future53. That is why it is important to emphasize that animals should be considered because they are sentient (and not because they are animals or because they are living beings), and that this implies considering other, non-organic sentient beings, should they come to exist.
11.6. Classification of s-risks
S-risks can be classified in terms of various aspects54. Here are some examples:
| Classification of s-risks according to how they arise55 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Type | They occur... | Examples |
| Incidental | When ways of achieving a certain goal generate a great deal of suffering, but without the suffering being sought for its own sake. The agents may even prefer an alternative without suffering, but not be willing to pay the costs. | Suffering as an effect of high productivity (as in factory farming) or of obtaining information (as in animal experimentation). |
| Agential | When the agent wishes to cause the harm as an end. | Sadistic agents, or harm as an effect of feelings of hatred between groups. |
| Natural | They arise without the action of agents. | Suffering resulting from the way natural processes take place. |
| Examples of other classifications of s-risks56 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Classification | Explanation | |
| Known and unknown | This depends on whether or not we can imagine them today (just as people in the Middle Ages would not have imagined that the atomic bomb would appear, for example). | |
| Unknown s-risks according to how they arise | ||
| Incidental | When unknown mechanisms will lead to incidental s-risks. | |
| Agential | Agents may in the future come to have reasons to cause harm that we do not yet know about. | |
| Natural | The universe may already contain much more suffering than we imagine. |
Practice
Study layer. The answers are based on the chapter’s text.
What is carbonism?
Agential s-risks occur when...
Food for thought
If a digital mind said it felt pain, what would you do to find out whether that was true?
Author’s notes 7
- 48 This is the subject of Volume IX of this collection. On s-risks, see (2017, 2022); Daniel (2017), and (2015, 2019.). ↩
- 49 IX, ch. 1.2. ↩
- 50 IX, ch. 1.3. ↩
- 51 IX, ch. 1.4. ↩
- 52 For examples of projects to spread life beyond Earth, see Meot-Ner and Matloff (1979) and Burton (2004). For a critique of these practices from the standpoint of s-risks, see O’brien (2022). ↩
- 53 On this, see Tomasik (2015). ↩
- 54 These classifications follow those of Baumann (2022, p. 13-19). ↩
Sources cited in this text 8
The full list for the volume is in the Volume XII references.
- BAUMANN, T. Avoiding the worst final: how to prevent a moral cathastrophe. Center for Reducing Suffering, 2022.
- BAUMANN, T. S-risks: An introduction. Reducing Risks of Future Suffering: Toward a responsible use of new technologies, 2017. Disponível em: http://s-risks.org/intro/. Acesso em: 15 fev. 2019;
- BURTON, K. NASA Presents Star-Studded Mars Debate. NASA, 25 mar. 2004.
- DANIEL, M. S-risks: Why they are the worst existential risks, and how to prevent them. Foundational Research Institute, [s.l.], 2017.
- MEOT-NER, M.; MATLOFF, G. L Directed Panspermia: a Technical and Ethical Evaluation of Seeding the Universe. Journal of the British Interplanetary Society, v. 32, p. 419-23, 1979.
- O’BRIEN, G. D. Directed Panspermia, Wild Animal Suffering, and the Ethics of World- Creation. Journal of Applied Philosophy, v. 39, n. 1, 2022.
- TOMASIK, B. How Many Animals are There? Essays on Reducing Suffering, 07 ago. 2019.
- TOMASIK, B. Why digital sentience is relevant to animal activists. Animal Charity Evaluators, 03 fev. 2015.
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