Find our conversation here on YouTube or here on Podcast.

Henry (@henrymance) is the chief features writer for the Financial Times newspaper. He is the author of “How to Love Animals in a Human Shaped World.”

In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “what matters?” Sentientism is “evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” In addition to the video linked above, the audio is on our Podcast here on Apple and here on the other platforms​​​​​​.

We discuss:
0:00 Welcome

1:27 Henry’s Intro

• Studying environmental policy
• Photography and the natural world
• Working for a biodiversity think tank in Colombia
• Journalism at the Financial Times
• Writing “How to Love Animals…”
• “It hasn’t really been about changing my values… it’s been about trying to align my behaviours.”

3:25 What’s Real? Anglican Christianity

• Keith Thomas’ “Man and the Natural World”
• Different Christian perspectives on non-human animals
• Is the Noah’s Ark story one reason why we find zoos acceptable?
• “Noah’s Ark is not a particularly good model for conservation”
• “We think we’re Noah but in fact we’re the flood”
• Interviewing the Archbishop of Canterbury “Pets do go to heaven!”
• Animal Interfaith Alliance
• “Nobody has a monopoly on wisdom or compassion”
• Talking to Mongolian Buddhists about eating meat “if you don’t see the killing it’s less of a sin”
• How distance means we allow animal farming to continue
• JW: “The Dalai Lama isn’t vegan and he has no excuses”
• How Anglicanism focuses on compassion & love rather than dogmatic rules
• Obedience vs. compassion in religious ethics
• The church has often been behind the curve in ethics
• “Iris Murdoch’s idea of love helped me more than any direct religious underpinning”

13:00 What Matters?

• At first “I wanted animals to be OK because I liked looking at them.” Polar bears and orangutans
• The impact of humanity on wild animals
• Shifting to take the animals’ point of view
• Being forced to think about animal farming in Yuval Noah Harari’s Sapiens
• How viewing species of animals as “eaten” reduces our assessment of sentience
• We spend money on our pets medical bills that could save human lives
• “If it happens like this it must be tolerable”
• “Sentience is a pretty good starting point”
• Are bivalves & insects sentient?
• The richness of bee behaviour & the risks of insect farming
• “Surely people can see for themselves – that is a conscious animal”
• Edge cases vs. the core issue of animal farming
• “There is something really special about consciousness” vs biocentrism & ecocentrism
• Whether you care about sentience or ecosystems what you have in common is “Factory farming is a complete disaster”
• Invasive species, hunting as more challenging issues
• Fishing. From “sustainable population levels for human food” to concern for sentient fishes. Seaspiracy
• Darwin and David Attenborough. From collecting samples to recognising individuality
• Zoos: “These giraffes do not belong in this very expensive shed”
• Taking the perspective of “the other”
• Would our non-human animal ethics work for humans? If not, why not?
• Breeding deer, then “culling” them blaming overpopulation & selling their bodies for money
• Working on a pig farm for the book & realising “even on a ‘decent’ pig farm” life isn’t worth living
• Farming human toddlers for food?
• People are willing to have the debate. They have views. That’s exciting because they can be changed

40:25 A Better Future

• “Love for animals is one of society’s core values. Rationality is another.”
• “The book I wrote was partly inspired by having kids”
• Storybooks pretending that we know how to live alongside animals
• Lynda Korimboccus‘ “Peppa Pig Paradox” (previous guest!)
• Change has to happen because we can’t feed ourselves this way
• “The evidence all points one way”
• Improving welfare in animal farming can be worse for the environment & vice versa, so let’s just “cut it all out”
• The “West” spread its love of meat around the world
• Individual change is really crucial. We need to reject animal farming, not just feel uneasy about it
• Parallels with smoking
• Political & corporate change starts with personal change
• “If you ask a cafe owner for oat milk – the 3rd time you ask they’ll have it”
• #JustTransitions for animal farmers
• Thoreau: “Do the things which lie nearest to you which are difficult”
• Purity, perfection & journeys
• Greenwashing & ethicswashing
• Effective Altruism & Peter Singer. Obligation or opportunity?
• Tipping the system & switching the default
• The role of journalism.

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