The ethics of uncertain sentience is an area of

applied ethics Applied ethics is the practical aspect of morality, moral considerations. It is ethics with respect to real-world actions and their moral considerations in private and public life, the professions, health, technology, law, and leadership. For ex ...

concerned with how to treat individuals whose capacity for

sentience Sentience is the ability to experience feelings and sensations. It may not necessarily imply higher cognitive functions such as awareness, reasoning, or complex thought processes. Some writers define sentience exclusively as the capacity for ''v ...

—the ability to subjectively feel, perceive, or experience—remains scientifically or philosophically uncertain. The topic is particularly significant in

animal ethics Animal ethics is a branch of ethics which examines human-animal relationships, the moral consideration of animals and how nonhuman animals ought to be treated. The subject matter includes animal rights, animal welfare, animal law, speciesism, an ...

, where questions have arisen regarding the moral status of animals such as

crustaceans Crustaceans (from Latin meaning: "those with shells" or "crusted ones") are invertebrate animals that constitute one group of Arthropod, arthropods that are traditionally a part of the subphylum Crustacea (), a large, diverse group of mainly aquat ...

insects Insects (from Latin ') are hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs of jointed ...

, and

fish A fish (: fish or fishes) is an aquatic animal, aquatic, Anamniotes, anamniotic, gill-bearing vertebrate animal with swimming fish fin, fins and craniate, a hard skull, but lacking limb (anatomy), limbs with digit (anatomy), digits. Fish can ...

, and whether they can experience

pain Pain is a distressing feeling often caused by intense or damaging Stimulus (physiology), stimuli. The International Association for the Study of Pain defines pain as "an unpleasant sense, sensory and emotional experience associated with, or res ...

. It also applies to debates in neuroethics and the

ethics of artificial intelligence The ethics of artificial intelligence covers a broad range of topics within AI that are considered to have particular ethical stakes. This includes algorithmic biases, Fairness (machine learning), fairness, automated decision-making, accountabili ...

. A common approach to these issues involves invoking the

precautionary principle The precautionary principle (or precautionary approach) is a broad epistemological, philosophical and legal approach to innovations with potential for causing harm when extensive scientific knowledge on the matter is lacking. It emphasizes cautio ...

, which holds that in cases of uncertainty, it is morally preferable to assume sentience rather than risk causing harm to potentially sentient beings.

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Animal ethics

David Foster Wallace David Foster Wallace (February 21, 1962 – September 12, 2008) was an American writer and professor who published novels, short stories, and essays. He is best known for his 1996 novel ''Infinite Jest'', which ''Time (magazine), Time'' magazine ...

in his 2005 essay " Consider the Lobster" investigated the potential sentience and capacity of crustaceans to experience pain and the resulting ethical implications of eating them. In 2014, the philosopher Robert C. Jones explored the ethical question that Wallace raised, arguing that " en if one remains skeptical of crustacean sentience, when it comes to issues of welfare it would be most prudent to employ the precautionary principle regarding our treatment of these animals, erring on the side of caution". Maximilian Padden Elder takes a similar view regarding the capacity for fishes to feel pain, arguing that the "precautionary principle is the moral ethic one ought to adopt in the face of uncertainty". In the 2015 essay "Reconsider the Lobster", Jeff Sebo quotes Wallace's discussion of the difficulty of establishing whether an animal can experience pain. Sebo calls the question of how to treat individuals of uncertain sentience, the "sentience problem" and argues that this problem which "Wallace raises deserves much more philosophical attention than it currently receives." Sebo asserts that there are two motivating assumptions behind the problem: "sentientism about moral status"—the idea that if an individual ''is'' sentient, then they deserve moral consideration—and "uncertainty about other minds", which refers to scientific and philosophical uncertainty about which individuals are sentient. In response to the problem, Sebo lays out three different potential approaches: the incautionary principle, which postulates that in cases of uncertainty about sentience it is morally permissible to treat individuals as if they are not sentient; the precautionary principle, which suggests that in such cases we have a moral obligation to treat them as if they are sentient; and the expected value principle, which asserts that we are "morally required to multiply our credence that they are by the amount of moral value they would have if they were, and to treat the product of this equation as the amount of moral value that they actually have". Sebo advocates for the latter position. Cricket Shelter Modular Edible Insect Farm IMG 20200219 163454590

Cricket Shelter Modular Edible Insect Farm IMG 20200219 163454590

Jonathan Birch, in answer to the question surrounding animal sentience, advocates for a practical framework based on the precautionary principle, arguing that the framework aligns well with conventional practices in

animal welfare science Animal welfare science is the scientific study of the welfare of animals as pets, in zoos, laboratories, on farms and in the wild. Although animal welfare has been of great concern for many thousands of years in religion and culture, the investigat ...

. Simon Knutsson and Christian Munthe argue that from the perspective of

virtue ethics Virtue ethics (also aretaic ethics, from Greek []) is a philosophical approach that treats virtue and moral character, character as the primary subjects of ethics, in contrast to other ethical systems that put consequences of voluntary acts, pri ...

, that when it comes to animals of uncertain sentience, such as "fish, invertebrates such as crustaceans, snails and insects", that it is a "requirement of a morally decent (or virtuous) person that she at least pays attention to and is cautious regarding the possibly morally relevant aspects of such animals". Shelley A. Adamo argues that although the precautionary principle in relation to potential invertebrate sentience is the safest option, that it's not cost-free, as thoughtless legislation employed following the precautionary principle could be economically costly and that, as a result, we should be cautious about adopting it.

Environmental ethics

Kai Chan advocates for an environmental ethic, which is a form of ethical extensionism applied to all living beings because "there is a non-zero probability of sentience and consciousness" and that "we cannot justify excluding beings from consideration on the basis of uncertainty of their sentience".

Ethics of artificial intelligence

Nick Bostrom Nick Bostrom ( ; ; born 10 March 1973) is a Philosophy, philosopher known for his work on existential risk, the anthropic principle, human enhancement ethics, whole brain emulation, Existential risk from artificial general intelligence, superin ...

and

Eliezer Yudkowsky Eliezer S. Yudkowsky ( ; born September 11, 1979) is an American artificial intelligence researcher and writer on decision theory and ethics, best known for popularizing ideas related to friendly artificial intelligence. He is the founder of and ...

argue that if an artificial intelligence is sentient, then it is wrong to inflict it unnecessary pain, in the same way that it is wrong to inflict pain on an animal, unless there are "sufficiently strong morally overriding reasons to do so". They also advocate for the "Principle of Substrate Non-Discrimination", which asserts: "If two beings have the same functionality and the same conscious experience, and differ only in the substrate of their implementation, then they have the same moral status." Soenke Ziesche and

Roman Yampolskiy Roman Vladimirovich Yampolskiy (; born in Riga, 13 August 1979) is a Latvian computer scientist at the University of Louisville, mostly known for his work on AI safety and cybersecurity. He holds a PhD from the University at Buffalo (2008). He ...

coined the term "AI welfare" and outlined the new field of AI welfare science, which is derived from

Neuroethics

Adam J. Shriver argues for "precise, precautionary, and probabilistic approaches to sentience" and asserts that the evidence provided by neuroscience has differing relevance to each; he concludes that basic protections for animals should be guided by the precautionary principle and that although neuroscientific evidence in certain instances is not necessary to indicate that individuals of certain species require protections, "ongoing search for the neural correlates of sentience must be pursued in order to avoid harms that occur from mistaken accounts."

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Animal ethics

Environmental ethics

Ethics of artificial intelligence

Neuroethics

See also

References

Further reading