Don't Void Your Pets

By Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-03T20:22 (+23)

This is a linkpost to https://www.goodthoughts.blog/p/dont-void-your-pets

[I hadn't planned to share this post here, since it seems a bit tangential to EA, but a reader asked for it to be cross-posted. I guess it raises broader issues re: how we think about the value of animal lives, and when it makes sense to make preventing existence your end goal.]

Gary Francione & Anna Charlton argue that, no matter how well we treat companion animals, domestication violates their rights. Further, they assume that these rights-violations are so morally important that we should prefer that these animals never exist at all (no matter how good their lives might be):

We would be obliged to care for those domesticated animals who presently exist, but we would bring no more into existence… We love our dogs, but recognise that, if the world were more just and fair, there would be no pets at all, no fields full of sheep, and no barns full of pigs, cows and egg-laying hens. There would be no aquaria and no zoos.

This is an example of the nihilism-adjacent philosophical pathology that I warn against in ‘Don’t Valorize the Void’—emphasizing moral negatives while neglecting positive value—a pathology that sucks people into thinking that non-existence is some kind of moral ideal.

More recently, Richard Healey has argued that pets should not exist because we have “illegitimate power” over them:

Our ability to exercise power by imposing coercion, force, and threats must be justified if it is to be legitimate. And there is no reason to think that the same is not true of our power over non-human animals…
in keeping pets, we systematically set back their interests in having control over their own body, actions, and environment… Just think of the familiar sight of a dog being tied to a lamppost, pulled along by a lead, or confined in a kennel.

Does being tied to a lamppost for a few minutes suffice to establish that a dog’s life is so intolerable as to not be worth living? Hmm. I’d say that domesticated life seems both (i) clearly good overall, and (ii) the best form of life that’s realistically available for many non-human animals. (I know I’d much rather be reincarnated as a well-cared-for companion animal than as a starving, parasite-ridden stray. Yeah, even at the cost of a minute spent tied to a lamppost!) If these two conditions are satisfied, then the “power”—or guardianship—that we exercise over our pets is straightforwardly justified by those very facts.

Lessons for moral theory

I think it’s a strong count in favor of a broadly beneficentric approach to moral theory that it so straightforwardly verifies sensible views on this topic. Conversely, it’s a cost of deeply anti-consequentialist views (that grant immense non-instrumental significance to “rights”) that it can so easily careen off the rails, as seen above. Some more practical upshots I’d encourage folks to bear in mind:

If you find yourself positing “rights” (e.g. against domestication) that are contrary to the interests of the putative rights-holder, then something has clearly gone wrong. (Though non-consequentialists may struggle to explain why this is so. Why don’t we have a “right” not to be exposed to oxygen without our express consent?)
It’s not friendly to the interests of a (possible) happy individual to argue that they should not exist. In cases where there’s no trade-off with others’ interests, but you’re instead just prioritizing moral purity over good lives, then—again—something has gone badly wrong with your whole approach to ethics.

Next time you pet Fluffy, and she purrs appreciatively, take a moment to appreciate in turn how wonderful it is that she exists. Then consider sharing this post, or finding some other way to push back against the value-of-life denialists.

P.S. It's a separate question whether (e.g. carnivorous) pets have sufficient negative externalities as to outweigh the positive value of their own lives. If they do, then I'd recommend "meat offsets" rather than pet abolitionism, since the latter involves distinctive losses that I don't think we should welcome.

JoA🔸 @ 2025-05-04T07:02 (+9)

I appreciate some of the concerns raised here, and share some of them myself (I think focusing on "rights", especially in the way Francione and Charlton usually frame them, has been unhelpful in animal ethics, especially when it comes to the discipline's public image).

However, while I don't want to be holding linkposts to unreasonable standards (and the post would probably have been more nuanced if it had been planned as an EA Forum linkpost), I did find the article quite uncharitable to the two things it critiques: the calling into attention of the harms that can come to domestic animals, and minimalist axiologies.

Regarding the former: in the comments, you mention second-order effects that could come from "humane farming" in the future, but in the post itself, you don't link the strays whose lives you acknowledge to be bad to the breeding of pets themselves. Currently, domestic animals are often bred in operations with poor welfare standards, and many are mistreated and abandoned by their owners. I do think Francione and Charlton are not doing the cause a favor by pointing to "rights" instead of the tangible, terrible experiences that millions of domestic animals face every year, but I don't think it can be said that there's "no trade-off" with another's interests here: if we focus on domestic animals that will live long, good lives, and think it's important that more exist and thus think that the pet industry should continue existing as it currently does, this will cause more strays (not to mention all the short and miserable lives that end at the puppy mills itself), and more domestic animals who might end up in homes where they are mistreated.

So to me, this example isn't a spotless application of the idea you wish to defend: but I'm also not sure there are any good applications of this idea that can be as broad as "the existence of pets", as there are generally significant trade-offs with other's interests when creating good lives, as our resources could be allocated elsewhere (as has been pointed out by Magnus Vinding).

Regarding the latter: calling a philosophical position "a pathology" with no further justification is not the sort of thing I usually expect to find on the forum, though it's still common when it comes to minimalist axiologies and related views.

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-04T22:35 (+4)

Regarding the latter: calling a philosophical position "a pathology" with no further justification is not the sort of thing I usually expect to find on the forum

Agreed; same for the reference to the position here being strong because "it straightforwardly verifies sensible views on the topic".

Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-05T02:17 (+5)

You think it's a norm violation for me to say that it's "sensible" to allow happy pets to exist? Or, more abstractly, that it's good for a theory to have sensible implications?

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-05T09:47 (+5)

I think the “pathology” comment is probably a norm violation. The “sensible” comment feels more like circular reasoning I guess? (Or maybe it doesn’t feel obvious to me, and perhaps therefore it irks me more than it does others.)

JoA🔸 @ 2025-05-06T12:09 (+7)

To be precise, I didn't say the post committed any norm violation (and Henry Stanley didn't either), I made the vaguer claim that it doesn't fit the standards of discussion that are often seen on the EA Forum (a "generous" approach, scout mindset).

Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-06T15:44 (+1)

I think it's very strange to say that a premise that doesn't feel obvious to you "is not the sort of thing [you] usually expect to find on the forum." (Especially when the premise in question would seem obvious common sense to, like, 99% of people.)

If an analogy helps, imagine a post where someone points out that commonsense requires us to reject SBF-style "double or nothing" existence gambles, and that this is a good reason to like some particular anti-fanatical decision theory. One may of course disagree with the reasoning, but I think it would be very strange for a bullet-biting Benthamite to object that this invocation of common sense was "not the sort of thing I usually expect to find on the forum." (If true, that would suggest that their views were not being challenged enough!)

(I also don't think it would be a norm violation to, say, argue that naive instrumentalism is a kind of "philosophical pathology" that people should try to build up some memetic resistance against. Or if it is, I'd want to question that norm. It's important to be able to honestly discuss when we think philosophical views are deeply harmful, and while one generally wants to encourage "generous" engagement with alternative views, an indiscriminate demand for universal generosity would make it impossible to frankly discuss the exceptions. We should be respectful to individual interlocutors, but it's just not true that every view warrants respect. An important part of the open exchange of ideas is openness to the question of which views are, and which are not, respectable.)

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-06T17:38 (+4)

Not what I was saying. More like, it’s a weak argument to merely say “my position generates a sensible-sounding conclusion and thus is more likely to be true”, and it would surprise me if eg a highly-upvoted EA Forum post used this kind of circular reasoning. Or is that what you’re defending?

I suppose I agree that we’re not obliged to give every crackpot view equal airtime - I just disagree that “pets have net negative lives” is such a view.

Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-06T18:32 (+9)

To be clear: the view I argued against was not "pets have net negative lives," but rather, "pets ought not to exist even if they have net positive lives, because we violate their rights by owning/controlling them." (Beneficentrism makes no empirical claims about whether pets have positive or negative lives on net, so it would make no sense to interpret me as suggesting that it supports any such empirical claim.)

It's not "circular reasoning" to note that plausible implications are a count in favor of a theory. That's normal philosophical reasoning - reflective equilibrium. (Though we can distinguish "sensible-sounding" from actually sensible. Not everything that sounds sensible at first glance will prove to be so on further reflection. But you'd need to provide some argument to undermine the claim; it isn't inherently objectionable to pass judgment on what is or isn't sensible, so objecting to that argumentative structure is really odd.)

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-07T14:15 (+8)

I'm still skeptical of using 'obviousness'/'plausibility' as evidence of a theory being correct - as a mental move it risks proving too much. Multiple theories might have equally obvious implications. Plenty of previously-unthinkable views would have been seen to be deeply un-obvious.

You have your intuitions and I have mine - we can each say they're obvious to us and it gets us no further, surely? Perhaps I'm being dense.

In Don't Valorize The Void you say:

Omelas is a very good place, and it's deeply irrational to condemn it. We can demonstrate this by noting that from behind a veil of ignorance, where you had an equal chance to be any affected individual (including the kid in the basement), it would be prudent to gamble on Omelas.

If it was so straightforwardly irrational (dare I say it - insensible), Le Guin would presumably never have written the story in the first place! Not everyone behind the veil of ignorance would take the gamble, despite the naked assertion that 'it would be prudent' to do so.

Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-07T15:28 (+4)

If it was so straightforwardly irrational (dare I say it - insensible), Le Guin would presumably never have written the story in the first place!

This is bad reasoning. People vary radically in their ability to recognize irrationality (of various sorts). In the same way that we shouldn't be surprised if a popular story involves mathematical assumptions that are obviously incoherent to a mathematician, we shouldn't be surprised if a popular story involves normative assumptions that others can recognize as obviously wrong. (Consider how Gone with the Wind glorifies Confederate slavery, etc.)

It's a basic and undeniable fact of life that people are swayed by bad reasoning all the time (e.g. when it is emotionally compelling, some interests are initially more salient to us than others, etc.).

You have your intuitions and I have mine - we can each say they're obvious to us and it gets us no further, surely?

Correct; you are not my target audience. I'm responding here because you seemed to think that there was something wrong with my post because it took for granted something that you happen not to accept. I'm trying to explain why that's an absurd standard. Plenty of others could find what I wrote both accurate and illuminating. It doesn't have to convince you (or any other particular individual) in order to be epistemically valuable to the broader community.

If you find that a post starts from philosophical assumptions that you reject, I think the reasonable options available to you are:

(1) Engage in a first-order dispute, explaining why you think different assumptions are more likely to be true; or

(2) Ignore it and move on.

I do not think it is reasonable to engage in ~~silencing~~ procedural criticism, claiming that nobody should post things (including claims about what they take to be obvious) that you happen to disagree with.

[Update: struck-through a word that was somewhat too strong. But "not the sort of thing I usually expect to find on the forum" implicates more than just "I happen to disagree with this," and something closer to "you should not have written this."]

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-07T16:07 (+4)

I’m going to bow out - wasn’t my intention to try to “silence” anybody and I’m not quite sure how we got there!

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-04T12:47 (+8)

Although they're presented in adjacent sentences, this:

I’d say that domesticated life seems both (i) clearly good overall, and (ii) the best form of life that’s realistically available for many non-human animals.

seems distinct from:

(I know I’d much rather be reincarnated as a well-cared-for companion animal than as a starving, parasite-ridden stray. Yeah, even at the cost of a minute spent tied to a lamppost!)

I would also prefer to be a companion animal over being a stray – but I would probably prefer not to exist than exist as a companion animal.

Needless to say I don't think companion animal lives are "clearly" good overall. I think "a minute tied to a lamppost" is a bit sanguine. Companion animals are subjected to all sorts of unpleasant experiences: surgeries like neutering/spaying, boredom, lack of autonomy over basic functions and routine, confinement, breeding-related health issues.

I suspect this varies a lot - e.g. I think rabbits probably have overall net negative lives, being prey animals and often neglected, kept in cages outside with little to do, fear from predators, unable to perform their natural habits. Cats and dogs probably have a better time.

RyanCarey @ 2025-05-03T21:37 (+6)

I guess a lot of these faulty ideas come from the role of morality as a system of rules for putting up boundaries around acceptable behaviour, and for apportioning blameworthiness moreso than praiseworthiness. Similar to how the legal system usually gives individuals freedom so long as they're not doing harm, our moral system mostly speaks to harms (rather than benefits) from actions (rather than inaction). By extension, the basis of the badness of these harms has to be a violation of "rights" (things that people deserve not to have done to them). Insofar as morality serves as a series of heuristics for people to follow, having a negativity-bias and action-bias are not necessarily wrong. It causes problems, however, if it this distorted lens is used to make claims about intrinsic right and wrong, or the idea that non-existence is an ideal.

Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-04T00:29 (+13)

Yeah, insofar as we accept biased norms of that sort, it's really important to recognize that they are merely heuristics. Reifying (or, as Scott Alexander calls it, "crystallizing") such heuristics into foundational moral principles risks a lot of harm.

(This is one of the themes I'm hoping to hammer home to philosophers in my next book. Besides deontic constraints, risk aversion offers another nice example.)

RyanCarey @ 2025-05-04T00:57 (+3)

Nice, I'll look forward to reading this!

Henry Stanley 🔸 @ 2025-05-07T12:51 (+2)

This got added as a comment on the original Substack article; think it's worth reading in this context:

https://expandingcircle.substack.com/p/the-dark-side-of-pet-ownership

Vasco Grilo🔸 @ 2025-05-03T21:04 (+2)

Thanks for sharing, Richard! Would you also support factory-farming animals with sufficiently good lives, ignoring effects on wild animals? I would.

Richard Y Chappell🔸 @ 2025-05-04T00:40 (+15)

Sure, in principle. (Though I'd use a different term, like 'humane farms', to contrast with the awful conditions on what we call 'factory farms'.) The only question is whether second-order effects from accepting such a norm might generally make it harder for people to take animal interests sufficiently seriously -- see John & Sebo (2020).

The same logic would, of course, suggest there's no intrinsic objection to humanely farming extra humans for their organs, etc. (But I think it's clearly good for us to be appalled by that prospect: such revulsion seems part of a good moral psychology for protecting against gross mistreatment of people in other contexts. If I'm right about that, then utilitarianism will endorse our opposition to humane human farming on second-order grounds. Maybe something similar is true for non-humans, too -- though I regard that as more of an open question.)

Vasco Grilo🔸 @ 2025-05-04T08:17 (+2)

Thanks, Richard! That makes sense to me.