Paradise-Engineering, Reprogramming the Biosphere

David Pearce

Hello, greetings from the UK. Sorry about these technical hiccups. One of the criticisms people have of of transhumanist technologies is well, couldn’t everything go wrong? And it’s a very good rule of thumb, anything that can go wrong will will will go right.

David Pearce

Um yeah, essentially um I wanted just to essentially to talk a little bit about today about um paradise uh engineering and the idea that it is going to be possible uh to genetically reprogrammed the biosphere and how thanks to modern technology, the level of suffering in the living world is essentially an adjustable parameter. And the question really I want to ask is I’m not going to engage in a theological debate or discussion. Essentially, I’m going to ask what level of suffering in the living world would a benevolent God or super intelligence or simulator, if you take the simulation argument seriously, what level of suffering would a benevolent overlord want us to choose for his creatures.

David Pearce

And as my text, I really wanted to start with the the Peaceable Kingdom. of Isaiah. If you could just scroll to the next slide, I think it is. Yes.

David Pearce

It’s worth I mean, the wolf shall live with a lamb, the leopard shall lie down with a kid. the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and the little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together, and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. So it’s a very, very ancient vision in a sense, a world without cruelty and suffering. Since time immemorial, some people have dreamed this kind of utopian vision of a peaceable kingdom.

David Pearce

But on the surface at any rate, naively, this is completely ecologically illiterate because yes, as mainstream Evolutionary biologists like Richard Dawkins would tell us essentially, yes, the idea of sentient beings living in harmony with each other, not starving or predating each other. Other, it’s biologically illiterate. I mean, yeah, literally, to quote Richard Dawkins, it must be so. And essentially a lot of my work over the past twenty years or so, twenty-five years, has been showing how technically at least it needn’t uh be so, and uh outwining uh technological proposals such that if we agree that it is good to phase out all forms of involuntary pain and suffering, not merely in humans, but but also the rest of the living world, it’s possible to do so. And indeed, yeah, it’s possible even sketch out a hundred technically at least a hundred year plan to make this so.

David Pearce

Now I wasn’t today going to go over in in detail some of these proposals, but anyone uh interested who who who wants to uh uh click through the uh uh the Uh the slides, the PDF shows some more uh technical uh uh i information about uh what what is involved. Um

David Pearce

But yeah, well essentially I wanted to have a discussion uh with with with with people today as to whether you think this is a desirable uh a a goal uh to get rid of all forms of involuntary suffering. I will just say just a very uh uh a little bit about uh the tech the the technology. Otherwise people would just say it’s uh utopian. So much would actually be involved in getting the involvement of involuntary pain and suffering.

David Pearce

What most people would perhaps find most troubling or disturbing is the idea that the human germline is programmable. and the level and for example, pain sensitivity. There are lots of genes involved in pain sensitivity. pain sensitivity, but one, the SCN9A gene, has been called a so-called volume mob for pain. And Nonsense mutations abolish the capacity to to experience pain altogether. Other mutations give an extremely high or low paying threshold. And the question is, should we continue to have children by a kind of genetic crapshoot? Or alternatively, should we choose the level of pain sensitivity of our future children?

David Pearce

And yeah, I mean hopefully everyone listening is feeling comfortable. One forgets just how ghastly pain can be. But if you’ve ever met someone, some genetic outlier, the kind of person who says, hey, you know, it’s just a useful sequencing mechanism. It’s possible to preserve functionality without the extremes of raw nastiness.

David Pearce

Now I gather from the introduction as I was asked to to say a little bit about gradients of bliss. One possibility for the future, it’s not one that I or transhumanist canvas, is essentially just raw indiscriminate bliss or happiness. So this would be the end of civilization, responsibility, intellectual insight. This is not what is being proposed here.

David Pearce

But it is also possible to choose approximately the hedonic set points of our future children and possibly our future selves. What’s a hedonic set point? Essentially, it’s the default average level of well being or ill being that most people experience in the course of a lifetime. One of my one of our transhumanist colleagues Anders Sandberg, when prompted, did once say, yes, I do have a ridiculously high hedonic set point. And the idea of going of ratcheting up hedonic set points is that it doesn’t involve choosing between conflicting values and preferences. You can preserve your core values and preferences and yet at the same time your default hedonic tone can in principle be shifted upwards.

David Pearce

And tragically, so many people Today, through no fault of their own, have a very low hedonic set point. They suffer from chronic uh depression and malaise and we know uh that uh hedonic set point uh have a high degree of genetic grading and we are out neuroscience for particular genes involved.

David Pearce

Two other, I mean I’m shortly going to, I said I promised I wouldn’t go off on a very long technical speech. But two other key points that I want to stress. You may recall from Isaiah, can we see the next slide if that’s okay? Uh he he that killeth an ox is is uh is as if he slew a man. Now uh

David Pearce

Essentially, pigs, uh, cattle, sheep are as sentient as small children. And Well, perhaps the biggest source of severe and readily avoidable suffering in the world today is factory farming and slaughterhousing. And if we want to make the vision of Isaiah come true, of course it’s not just Isaiah, it’s also vision of Gautama Buddha. May all the things. of life be delivered from suffering. There are ways ways to do that. Transhumanism isn’t just about moralizing, it’s about technical solutions to moralising problems and the advent of concured meat and meat substitutes means that in principle At any rate, it’s possible to, in a sense, veganize the world.

David Pearce

You know, the terrible plague that is just just almost upon us now essentially if it weren’t for meat eating zoonotic disease like this would be extremely infrequent. And if we are prepared to make the transition to a vegan or a cultured meat lifestyle, we will Get rid of, as I said, one of the worst forms of severe and avoidable suffering in the world.

David Pearce

So, the final thank of Of the abolitionist project, i. e. , of getting rid of involuntary pain and suffering, is the suffering of free-living non-humans, sentient beings. uh that uh are in many ways uh akin uh to s to infants and small toddlers. And uh yeah, right now, sadly, that there are millions of sentient being beings who are starving, millions that are living in terror, running for their lives, being parasitised.

David Pearce

But a combination of CRISPR genome editing and synthetic gene drives, and I can explain this in the discussion if anyone is interested. In principle, at any rate, allow us to create a living world in which sentient beings Do not harm each other. The Bible, Isaiah, is actually rather light on the technical details as to how the lion and the lamb can lie down. together, but nonetheless, with a bit of modest genetic tweaking, with perhaps culture uh catnip-laced in vitro meat in the meantime, yes, it is possible. to show how existing predators uh can be civilized.

David Pearce

Um now one might think well if it it intuitively, uh if uh predators were not uh uh harming and eating herbivore population then there will be an uncontrolled population exposure followed by ecological collapse. But once again, if we decide we want to get rid of cruelty and suffering the profits fore foretold. This is now feasible. One can use uh cross species fertility regulation via uh immuno contraception. One can use tunable gene drives that cheat the supposedly immutable laws of Mendelian inheritance. Essentially every cubic metre of the planet is shortly going to be accessible to micromanagement and control. And even the deep oceans and Amazonia, there are intuitively how on earth could one possibly hope to ensure a happy civilized biosphere. Technically these are feasible options. We’re not going to run out of computational resources.

David Pearce

So yeah, just wrapping up this introduction, if perhaps we can just scroll down the the slides. I’m afraid we’re going to skim through a lot of stuff towards the end. Otherwise, I’ll go on talking too long. Very last slide. Yes, yes. Yeah, this is it. This is it. Anyone who is still interested, yeah, essentially some of the slides provide hot links. details and I’m happy to provide more detail at all.

David Pearce

But the purpose of sketching out these kind of blueprints is that only once we know what is technically feasible can we start having an ethical debate. And for many people, I think the idea that wild animal suffering is a problem or that in somehow we are complicit in the suffering of of non-humans yet will be quite alien to them. And yeah, we’re just scrolling through some slides now, which say a bit more about uh uh uh synthetic gene drive, um, and yeah, obligate predators.

Speaker 2

If I’m advancing too quickly, just let me know.

David Pearce

No, it is fantastic because as I said, although I could uh happily talk for a long time, what I really wanted to do is to take questions, have a discussion with members of the audience. But this is what I really wanted just to conclude at.

David Pearce

Yeah, the idea that it is actually possible To have a world without involuntary suffering will strike most people as ecologically illiterate, that the Bible or Gautama Buddha does simply didn’t know what they were talking about. But this isn’t the case if we are prepared to use technology.

David Pearce

And as I said, although I I uh wasn’t intending to uh engage in it in in theology. I mean, I suppose the question I really want to to ask is regardless of of someone’s stance on uh yeah, the nature of reality and whether they believe in God or whatnot. Should we use the new technologies, biotech, CRISPR, genome editing and AI to reduce uh or even uh eliminate uh involuntary suffering because in principle it is possible to have a signaling system based entirely on information sensitive gradients of well being. And I’ll stress the information sensitive. I want isn’t asking people to give up their core values and preferences on the altar on the altar of someone else’s conception of a good life or utopia.

David Pearce

Needless to say, yeah, all manner of things could go wrong. All manner of dilemmas are are opened up by these Technologies, but when someone says, as most people would do, there is no alternative to a world of pain and suffering, I think we are now entitled to say, well, yes, actually, there is an alternative.

Speaker 2

Excellent. At this stage, would you like to take some questions from the audience?

David Pearce

Yes, yes, that would be great. Sorry if I’ve gobbled or anything, or I was frustrated by the technical challenges.

Speaker 2

Actually, you’re holding up quite well. So what because of the fact that you can’t directly hear what people are saying, I will basically repeat the question that I hear coming from the audience, okay? That’d be great. Go ahead, everyone. All right. I got one. Yep. Richard Harvey joins with a question of his.

Speaker 3

I’ll say really quick, too. So we’ve got a bunch in the chat, and then we’ll let people kind of go. Maybe if you can also like raise your hand, there’s a little option to do that. And oh gosh, how do I get back there? So Michael Ann, I’m going to rely on you to if any additional questions need To be shared that are in the chat or whatever. I can’t click anywhere. I’ve got my hands full here. So we’ll take questions from the audience, but if you want to interject, just go ahead, okay?

Speaker 2

Okay, so we’ll let Richard go, and then I’ve got a few from Jennedy and from Trevor and from Connie. And we’ve got about fifteen, twenty minutes to do this. So go ahead, Richard. Okay, so we have about fifteen or twenty minutes here left with you, David, and I’m now hearing Richard’s question, and I will relay that to you.

Speaker 4

Okay. So for everyone who can hear me directly, there’s a great sequence in Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, where a cow that is very much looking forward to be butchered because it’s been caused to experience the process is intensely pleasurable and also has been made as intelligent as a human comes out and tries to get itself eaten. And it’s a really funny sequence, and everyone should read Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy again. So question, why not create a biosphere where natural processes as they exist now are not merely subverted, but are simply made pleasant or preferable to organisms that are presently victims of suffering because of the natural order.

Speaker 2

So Richard asks, why not create a biosphere in which the things and I’m already forgetting some of it, but the things that are presently happening to the organization In the biosphere become pleasurable to these beings instead of what was the alternative, Richard? Entirely subverting processes as they exist. Instead of entirely subverting processes as they currently exist.

David Pearce

Ooh, well, in one sense, I think the the possibility that I think that this isn’t a biblical text, this is the uh the hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy, the channel that wants to be Eaton. Um depending on on one’s uh uh a a value uh a value scheme, yes, it might be possible to re-engineer features such that they did not mind what are naively terrible things happening to them. them. But nonetheless, yeah, in terms of the actual level of genetic reprogramming involved, the obstacles there would be daunting. And what I’ve sketched out is is I would see it’s one or two modest genetic tweaks, but uh if one is going to have creatures who in some sense can uh enjoy uh starving to death uh or being uh asphyxiated or uh or anything like that, this would be a major Engineering challenge. Well, more than a major engineering challenge. I’m assuming as much as it’s personally, and this is a personal View, I would not be bad if, in a sense, the whole traditional Darwinian life forms, crocodiles, snakes, tigers that have in a sense Sense formed other sentient beings were retired, but most people seem to be quite aghast at the notion of a world without Members of the cat family. And if one wants to preserve a recognizable approximation of so-called charismatic megafauna. I mean if if if if the lion really is to lie down with the uh the lamb as Isaiah foretells, then uh yeah, some gen some l some genetic tweaking will be needed or at least uh yeah, possibly catnipped catnip laced in midramit or or something like that. So uh yeah, that’s not a full answer to the uh question, but uh uh yeah, I wouldn’t know where to begin the kind of engineering challenge of uh arranging cows that want to be eaten.

Speaker 2

Yeah, thank you very much. So the I’m I’m going to share with you that ironically or serendipitously Richard shared the cow the anecdote of the cow that wants to be eaten in Hitchhiker’s Guide before he asked the question. So you guys were both thinking on the exact same wavelength here. I have another question. So, this comes from Genadi Stolarov, and he says: given that its meat consumption is still highly advisable for health, He says basically do you think that the widespread advent of lab grown cruelty free meat will be the necessary step to convince many people who are not comfortable with vegan Or vegetarianism to basically go for that? Do you think that this will be the key component for a society-wide shift toward avoiding the killing of animals for purposes of food consumption?

David Pearce

Um yeah, a couple of points here. First, uh as though uh a fair number of people are convinced that uh a meat-based diet is uh essential to health. I mean of course there there have been entire or there are entire uh cultures uh for example of the Indian subcontinent that have a vegetarian or even quasi vegan diet. Jeans, for example, have been vegetarians for thousands of years. And here in the West, statistically, vegetarians tend to live longer. than meat eaters, uh tend to be uh slimmer, record higher, like two score. I mean essentially uh uh there are a whole bunch of uh uh confounding variables. Around 20% of the world’s population don’t eat meat. There are certainly problems becoming if one is going to become a strict vegan.

David Pearce

yeah, people who uh decide simultaneously to slim or don’t trust uh nutritional medicine and therefore uh omit to take written vitamins. Um but uh yeah, I’m skeptical that essentially one could close factory farms and slaughterhouses without uh asking People to adopt a strict uh vegan diet. But in practice, and I say in practice, um, that the reason I think we are going to switch to cruelty-free diets this century is yeah cultured conscious meat. Um that and kind of say I have a very dark conception of uh of of human nature. Any calling on people to make sacrifices, and many people do regard making a sacrifice To vegetarian or vegan lifestyle as a sacrifice. A lot of people just aren’t going to do it. And the most effective way to make the transition to uh yeah a cruelty-free lifestyle, to get the uh the death factories, factory farms, slaughterhouses uh closed is to create uh Uh of a of a of a texture and taste that is identical to that of slaughtered non-human animals. Now, cultured meat could be genetically engineered, but given the level of anxiety this triggers, it’s probably far better to stress that it is uh at uh that is that it’s natural that it that it’s natural. It doesn’t need to be genetic if it’s genetically engineered at all.

David Pearce

Uh and indeed if uh the uh uh powers that be uh had uh invested uh resources in developing and commercializing uh uh cultured meat. Uh yes, this terrible plague uh now uh upon us would not have occurred quite aside from the horrendous costs in terms of human suffering, the economic costs going to run to uh uh perhaps ten ten well, I don’t know, eight, ten, twelve, fourteen trillion dollars astronomical amount. So it it it is to the benefit of humans and non-human animals alike if Get rid of the obscenity of factory farming and slaughterhouses. And so, yes, I very much hope that all people of good Basically, decently will support this a transition to growth if we die.

Speaker 2

Thank you. So, because we only have time for one or two more questions. What we’re going to ask everyone to do is to post additional questions that they have in the campfire. And I can’t guarantee, because of the technical difficulties that we are experiencing, that David will be able to stay on the entire conference. But we will make sure that we relay these questions to him and get his delayed responses. David, we’d love to have you stay on if you can figure out what’s going on with your audio. But if it We totally understand if uh the conference experience isn’t sufficiently blissful for you.

David Pearce

Oh, not at all. I’m just uh I’m impressed at how you this is it. The slightest technical challenge or history up in life I tend to go to pieces. I’m impressed at how you take these things in your stride.

David Pearce

No, it’s more a case of uh apologies to to anyone who’s been uh frustrated because they want to To offer criticisms and yeah, haven’t yet been able to do so. But yeah, essentially I’m around, as you probably gathered, like most People are not uh and so on. So, yeah, anyone with uh questions and criticisms, I’d be delighted to uh yeah, fit me in at uh

Speaker 2

Excellent. So what we’ll do then is, as as we receive questions for you. We we’ll just um I mean, would it would it be all right if we shared your email as well with the audience? Clearly, yes, okay.

David Pearce

This is uh anyone, as I said, the uh anyone who isn’t uh totally aghast at at the uh at the at what I’ve been talking about, yeah, is that you these uh the PDF contains them uh uh uh some links my email davidheadweb. com headweb was the uh original mother load site back in uh nineteen ninety six that I uh Uh yeah, set up like, you know, the heathen is the comparative in spite of it just deporting title or things like that. Please use biotech to

Speaker 2

Excellent. Okay, so we will share both the PDF and your email, but in the meantime, we’ve got time for one more question. And I’m going to go ahead and ask this one from Jeremy Hadfield. He says, what is suffering? Or to state the question more technically Technically, how do you know if the mental state of a sentient being other than yourself is suffering? Understanding what suffering is seems to be a prerequisite. For negative utilitarianism’s project of reducing suffering, but I don’t think there is a strong technical definition How do you determine if you have reduced the suffering of a non-human animal with any epistemic confidence?

David Pearce

Oh good heavens. Well this re you know, a a full answer would take a philosophical disquisition. I mean but take um take the you know the something like redness. Now I can’t define redness to someone who is congenitally uh colorblind. Redness has nothing intrinsically to do with particular wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation. I mean that one’s having experiences of readiness while dreaming and so forth. What we’re not dealing with here is how to overcome the problem Of radical skepticism. I think in principle it is possible to overcome the problem of radical scepticism. The so-called not so-called the Hoogan sisters, uh conjoined twins actually share a Thalmic bridge and can in some sense actually experience and feel and see uh each other’s perspective and in future it would be possible uh to uh engineer reversible founder bridges So one could do the equivalent of a Vulcan mind meld with fellow humans or indeed non-human animals.

David Pearce

But until we reach that point in our development, I would appeal essentially to the principle of the uniformity of nature and that Uh yeah, uh that when I have uh you know uh extremely unpleasant uh experience as a result of uh noxious stimuli? How do I know that you or a non-human animal experiences something similar? If one looks at the the neurology, the the genetics, the resp uh the particular structures, the neurotransmitter systems, the behavioural responses. there is an extraordinary convergence, that the neurotransmitter systems involved in processing noxious stimuli are very strongly conserved over hundreds of millions. Of years. So sure, I can’t know right now that you are experiencing pain, pleasure, or colour although

David Pearce

But short of radical scepticism, it’s an inference to the best explanation.