Upcoming AMA with Luke Muehlhauser on consciousness and moral patienthood (June 28, starting 9am Pacific)

By Julia_Wise🔸 @ 2017-06-21T21:56 (+13)

Luke Muehlhauser of the Open Philanthropy Project recently published a major report on animal consciousness and the question of "moral patienthood" — i.e. which beings merit moral concern? The purpose of the report is to inform Open Phil's grantmaking, especially in its farm animal welfare focus area. Luke would like to hear your questions and objections, and he will host an "Ask Me Anything" session on the issues discussed in the report, here on the Effective Altruism Forum, starting at 9am Pacific on Wednesday, June 28th.

I hope you will read the report and then join in with lots of questions about the topics it covers: consciousness, moral patienthood, animal cognition, meta-ethics, moral weight, illusionism, hidden qualia, and more!

Luke would also like to note that much of the most interesting content in the report is in the appendices and even some footnotes, e.g. on unconscious vision, on what a more satisfying theory of consciousness might look like, and an explanation of attention schema theory (footnote 288).

(In case it's confusing why I'm posting this: I'm coming on as a moderator of the Forum, and will post shortly with more info about that.)

null @ 2017-06-22T01:05 (+6)

I super highly recommend reading this report. In full, including many of the appendices (and footnotes :) )

I thought it was really interesting, and helpful for thinking this question through and understanding the state of what evidence and arguments are out there (unfortunately there is much less to go on than I’d even expected, though).

I was the most proximate audience for the report, so discount my recommendation as much as feels appropriate with that in mind.

null @ 2017-06-28T16:01 (+2)

Update: the AMA is now live, here.