You have to define “suffer” more precisely. Which is the whole problem with qualia and experiential judgement. Personally, my answer is “anything with two neurons rubbing together can feel reward/loss results”. And I’m not sure other humans feel the same things the same way I do, let alone flatworms (though I generally stipulate that humans are close enough to reason about).
It seems likely (based on priors and analogy, not any measure I can think of) that, as brains get more complicated, that emotions and experiences are more intense. If so, one could set an arbitrary threshold of complexity for what one labels “suffering”. But why? The question should be “what and how much does X experience, and how do I aggregate that experience across beings in my moral calculations?” I don’t have an answer, and I don’t currently believe that there is an objective answer.
I agree with the point about the continuous ability to suffer rather than a threshold. I totally agree that there is no objective answer, we can’t measure sufferings. The problem is, however, that it leaves a practical question that is not clear how to solve, namely how we should treat other animals and our code.
You have to define “suffer” more precisely. Which is the whole problem with qualia and experiential judgement. Personally, my answer is “anything with two neurons rubbing together can feel reward/loss results”. And I’m not sure other humans feel the same things the same way I do, let alone flatworms (though I generally stipulate that humans are close enough to reason about).
It seems likely (based on priors and analogy, not any measure I can think of) that, as brains get more complicated, that emotions and experiences are more intense. If so, one could set an arbitrary threshold of complexity for what one labels “suffering”. But why? The question should be “what and how much does X experience, and how do I aggregate that experience across beings in my moral calculations?” I don’t have an answer, and I don’t currently believe that there is an objective answer.
I agree with the point about the continuous ability to suffer rather than a threshold. I totally agree that there is no objective answer, we can’t measure sufferings. The problem is, however, that it leaves a practical question that is not clear how to solve, namely how we should treat other animals and our code.