This is a crosspost for The Case for Insect Consciousness by Bob Fischer, which was originally published on Asterisk in January 2025. [Subtitle.] The evidence that insects feel pain is mounting, however we approach the issue. For years, I was on the fence about the possibility of insects feeling pain — sometimes, I defended the hypothesis;[1] more often, I argued against it.[2] Then, in 2021, I started working on the puzzle of how to compare pain intensity across species. If a human and a pig are suffering as much as each one can, are they suffering the same amount? Or is the human’s pain worse? When my colleagues and I looked at several species, investigating both the probability of pain and its relative intensity,[3] we found something unexpected: on both scores, insects aren’t that different from many other animals.  Around the same time, I started working with an entomologist with a background in neuroscience. She helped me appreciate the weaknesses of the arguments against insect pain. (For instance, people make a big deal of stories about praying mantises mating while being eaten; they ignore how often male mantises fight fiercely to avoid being devoured.) The more I studied the science of sentience, the less confident I became about any theory that would let us rule insect sentience out.  I’m a philosopher, and philosophers pride themselves on following arguments wherever they lead. But we all have our limits, and I worry, quite sincerely, that I’ve been too willing to give insects the benefit of the doubt. I’ve been troubled by what we do to farmed animals for my entire adult life, whereas it’s hard to feel much for flies. Still, I find the argument for insect pain persuasive enough to devote a lot of my time to insect welfare research. In brief, the apparent evidence for the capacity of insects to feel pain is uncomfortably strong.[4] We could dismiss it if we had a consensus-commanding theory of sentience that explained why the apparent evidence is ir

Introduction In this post, I present what I believe to be an important yet underexplored argument that fundamentally challenges the promise of cultivated meat. In essence, there are compelling reasons to conclude that cultivated meat will not replace conventional meat, but will instead primarily compete with other alternative proteins that offer superior environmental and ethical benefits. Moreover, research into and promotion of cultivated meat may potentially result in a net negative impact. Beyond critique, I try to offer constructive recommendations for the EA movement. While I've kept this post concise, I'm more than willing to elaborate on any specific point upon request. Finally, I contacted a few GFI team members to ensure I wasn't making any major errors in this post, and I've tried to incorporate some of their nuances in response to their feedback. From industry to academia: my cultivated meat journey I'm currently in my fourth year (and hopefully final one!) of my PhD. My thesis examines the environmental and economic challenges associated with alternative proteins. I have three working papers on cultivated meat at various stages of development, though none have been published yet. Prior to beginning my doctoral studies, I spent two years at Gourmey, a cultivated meat startup. I frequently appear in French media discussing cultivated meat, often "defending" it in a media environment that tends to be hostile and where misinformation is widespread. For a considerable time, I was highly optimistic about cultivated meat, which was a significant factor in my decision to pursue doctoral research on this subject. However, in the last two years, my perspective regarding cultivated meat has evolved and become considerably more ambivalent. Motivations and epistemic status Although the hype has somewhat subsided and organizations like Open Philanthropy have expressed skepticism about cultivated meat, many people in the movement continue to place considerable hop