Just commenting to state some obvious things that you already know, but I hope it doesn't hurt to hear them from someone else.

• You have a massive positive impact on invertebrates
• Rumination generally doesn't have much positive benefit
• The universe with a happier Aaron who doesn't spend a lot of time ruminating is a better universe, both for Aaron and for the invertebrates, than the universe with a guilty Aaron who spends a lot of time ruminating.

Bypassing guilt and rumination is far easier said than done, but the following framing helps me. You're on a great path, doing great and wonderful things for the world. Excessive focus on these less important (relative to the rest of your impact) decisions doesn't seem to contribute to that path. As you alluded to, it actively detracts from it. For me, conceptualising things like that really does help me bypass a lot of rumination; just stay the course, knowing that your path is a good one. If you were a terrible person, outputting 0 good in the world, then maybe it's worth ruminating more on these small things; but you are the polar opposite, and the invertebrates need you in good mental shape!

I doubt any of this helps, but at least I hope it doesn't make things worse! 

Keep up the great work.

The idea of fungi evolving to infect humans and resulting in apocalypse underpins the premise of the famous game and TV series "The Last of Us"

Given the series' critical acclaim and popularity, I wonder if it also demonstrates potential for engaging the public with this topic through mainstream popular media.

Independent of whether their approach is net positive or negative for factory farming, I feel like FarmKind missed an obvious slogan opportunity: "Have your steak and eat it too!"

Thanks for the information! I’d love to apply. Would you consider candidates interested in working at less than 1 FTE? The role sounds fascinating, but I currently hold other part-time positions that I’d like to continue alongside it.

What is the deadline for this application?

Hi there!

I'd be interested in working on some of these papers with you. I'm currently training as a Clinical Psychotherapist at King's College London and am keen on exploring the intersection between AI and therapy.

Feel free to either message me here or email me at k2478540@kcl.ac.uk

The studies I linked above started measuring 2-10 minutes after stunning, but there are other studies which have measured CNS activity before, during, and immediately after the stunning process - for example, Fregin & Bickmeyer (2016). Interestingly, they observed that before settling into a quiescent state, intense epileptic-form seizures occur in the CNS that last for up to an hour after stunning. In mammals, epileptic-form seizures are associated with a loss of consciousness and a lack of subjective experience during that period, suggesting insensibility (and this is roughly how the authors interpret their finding). However, more work needs to be done to better understand this phenomenon in decapod crustaceans.

I'm not focussing on the asphyxiation process, so I'll let someone with more knowledge in that area chime in. If no one does, I'd be happy to look into it!

If the central nervous system has truly stopped functioning, that would imply insensibility. That’s why loss of all measurable brain activity is taken as a sign of unconsciousness in clinical contexts. In humans, episodes with reduced CNS activity (for example, during deep anaesthesia or certain brain injuries) are generally associated with a lack of subjective experience.

For decapods, the challenge is that most studies measure spontaneous CNS activity rather than testing every possible form of responsiveness, such as testing to see whether we can evoke CNS responses through stimulation. So while prolonged inactivity is a strong sign of insensibility, researchers should still gather more data to increase confidence (especially given that, as you mention, we are putting a lot of resources behind this!)

These are all really important questions, and its great that you want to engage in discussion about it!

Have you looked at the Moral Weight Project? It's a great piece of work that tries to tackle the (very complex, as you state) issue of comparing the welfare of different species, including humans. All their assumptions are explicitly listed, so you can look through and see where you disagree. There is a great sequence about it on the forum here: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/s/y5n47MfgrKvTLE3pw

And I also wrote a couple of more accessible explainers of the project here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/16EdSGP1-xs0Mh4G6QfQYOaaYfduDEpp32NK5BBlznYE/edit?tab=t.0

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SIurNLZB8hSXTCKUNmREHmBt2sP4IQ4R0XkdYAZbYp0/edit?tab=t.0