Category Archives: Viva!

Crabs and lobsters deserve protection from being cooked alive – Jonathan Birch | Aeon Ideas

Crabs and lobsters have a tough time at the hands of humans. In most countries, they are excluded from the scope of animal welfare legislation, so nothing you do to them is illegal. The result is that they are treated in ways that would clearly be cruel if inflicted on a vertebrate.

This might in part be because they are so alien to us. It is hard to begin to imagine the inner life of a 10-legged, faceless creature with a nervous system distributed throughout its body. Worse still, crustaceans lack the headline-grabbing intelligence of the octopus. With only about 100,000 neurons in their nervous system compared with the octopus’s 500 million, crabs and lobsters are unlikely to set the ocean alight with their cognitive prowess. They are easy to overlook and difficult to empathise with.

Nevertheless, if you care about animal welfare, you should care what happens to crabs and lobsters. Consider live boiling. The animal often takes minutes to die, during which it writhes around and sheds its limbs. Crustaceans can be killed in seconds with knives, but most non-specialists don’t know the right technique. Electrocution using a ‘Crustastun’ takes about 10 seconds, and is probably as humane as it gets, but the expense of this device means it is hardly standard kitchen equipment. Some processing plants use them (and some UK supermarkets require their suppliers to do so), but many do not, and there is no legal requirement to stun. Crabs are often still, as one recent study put it, ‘processed in a live state’. ‘Processed’ here is a euphemism for ‘carved alive’.

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Does any of this matter ethically? For many, the key question here is whether these animals are capable of feeling anything – whether they are sentient. If they feel nothing as they are boiled or carved alive, then ethical qualms about these practices seem as misplaced as they would be for vegetables. But if they do feel – if they are sentient – then they are cruel and inhumane.

So what is the reality? Are crabs and lobsters sentient or not? Can science settle the issue? Before we can address this question, it helps to be clearer about what we’re looking for. I will focus here specifically on the phenomenon of pain. There is much more to an animal’s subjective experience of the world and of its own body than pain alone – but pain is the aspect of sentience with the most obvious ethical consequences.

Animal welfare scientists define pain as ‘an aversive sensation and feeling associated with actual or potential tissue damage’. When they talk about pain, they mean pain in its most elemental, evolutionarily ancient sense – a feeling that might have some but not all of the aspects of pain in humans. In particular, to feel pain in this basic sense, it is not necessary to be self-conscious – to be aware of oneself as being in pain.

Do crustaceans feel pain in this basic sense? Over the past few years, a series of experiments by the biologist Robert Elwood and colleagues at Queen’s University Belfast has demonstrated impressively sophisticated behaviour in crabs. Here is one example. Hermit crabs live in shells vacated by other animals. They prefer some types of shell to others, and will often switch from a less-preferred to a more-preferred shell in the wild. Elwood drilled holes in the hermit crabs’ shells and poked electrodes through the holes to see how they would react to small electric shocks – not a pleasant procedure, but a necessary one to gain insight into their responses.

Unsurprisingly, crabs would sometimes vacate a shell, even a good one, if the shock became too severe. More surprisingly, the crabs traded off the quality of the shell against the intensity of the shock received within it. For a given intensity of shock, they’d be more reluctant to give up a high-quality shell than a low-quality one. This is known as a motivational trade-off. The crabs were balancing their need to avoid shocks against their other needs.

In another experiment, Elwood and colleagues found that shore crabs rapidly learn to avoid locations they associate with harmful experiences. The crabs were offered a choice of two dark shelters: in one, they received shocks; in the other, they did not. In general, crabs prefer to return to shelters that they have previously occupied. But after repeatedly receiving a shock in one of the shelters, the crabs were much less likely to return to it – a phenomenon known as conditioned place avoidance.

Motivational trade-offs and conditioned place avoidance are what I call credible indicators of pain – credible because they cannot be explained away as mere reflexes, and because they tie in with a reasonable theory about the function of pain for animals that feel it. The idea in the background here is that pain is a guide to decision-making. To make flexible decisions, animals need to be able to weigh the seriousness of an injury against other things they need. Sometimes fleeing is the right thing to do; sometimes carrying on as normal is the right thing to do; sometimes tending the injury is the right thing to do – it depends on the situation. Pain is the currency in which the need to stop, or the need to flee, is measured. When we find an animal making flexible decisions by integrating information about past or present injury with information about its other needs, that is a credible indicator of pain.

Is it conceivable that motivational trade-offs and conditioned place avoidance occur without any pain? Of course, but no one is suggesting that pain is conclusively established by these experiments. We are talking about credible indicators, not conclusive proof. If we demand conclusive proof, this will never be attained – not for any animal, not even for other human beings.

What should we do, then, in this state of uncertainty? I suggest a common-sense approach: apply a version of the precautionary principle. The precautionary principle was originally devised for environmental policy. It says, in effect: when you’re uncertain about the link between human actions and a seriously bad outcome, don’t let your uncertainty prevent you from taking effective precautions. The principle has been applied to environmental threats as diverse as climate change and neonicotinoids (or neonics), the pesticides linked to colony collapse in bees.

It should also be applied to the question of animal sentience. I have recently proposed the following ‘animal sentience precautionary principle’:

Where there are threats of serious, negative animal welfare outcomes, lack of full scientific certainty as to the sentience of the animals in question shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent those outcomes.

In short: when the evidence is suggestive but not conclusive, give the animal the benefit of the doubt.

The phrase ‘lack of full scientific certainty’, taken from the 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, is, admittedly, far too vague. It does not specify the evidential standard that has to be met. This is why I have also proposed a specific, pragmatic standard: we should act to mitigate risks to animal welfare when there is at least one credible indicator of sentience in at least one species of the order of animals in question. The decapod crustaceans meet this standard. Arguably an even stronger case can be made for octopus, squid and cuttlefish, which already receive some protection in the European Union.

The phrase ‘cost-effective measures’ is also vague. So here is my specific, pragmatic proposal: when the evidential standard is met, we should bring the order of animals within the scope of animal welfare legislation in a way appropriate to their particular welfare needs. In the case of crustaceans, that means banning processing methods with a substantial risk of inflicting pain, such as live carving and live boiling.

To be clear, the precautionary principle is a guide to policy, not to individual action. In light of evidence of pain in crustaceans, you might feel it appropriate to stop eating them. That would be a reasonable reaction, but it isn’t entailed by my proposals, which are concerned with the law rather than with individual behaviour. What my proposals do entail is that decapod crustaceans deserve a basic level of legal protection.

We could wait for evidence to pile up, demanding more credible indicators in more species, while decapods continue to be ‘processed’ alive around the world. But there’s a good chance we’d regret our inaction, just as we might well come to regret our inaction over climate change and neonics. Alternatively, we could take precautions now. On climate change and neonics, it is common sense to act now to mitigate the risk of environmental disaster. Likewise, we should act now to protect decapods, to mitigate the risk of a continuing animal welfare disaster.

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Facebook and Google Are Actually ‘Net States.’ And They Rule the World

“We reject: kings, presidents, and voting. We believe in: rough consensus and running code.” So declared MIT professor David D. Clark in 1992. Twenty-five years later, this sentiment mirrors the global zeitgeist more than ever. The American public distrusts government in record numbers. Other nation-states disdain the US to world-historical degrees. A non-nation-state, Facebook, just topped 2 billion users—more than a quarter of the world’s population, surpassing even China’s population by almost 40 percent. In short, nation-states are not the only game in town anymore.

WIRED OPINION

ABOUT

Alexis Wichowski (@awichowski) teaches technology, media, and government at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. She is also the press secretary for the City of New York’s department of veterans’ services. Views expressed here are her own.

It is time to name this new landscape. The world is no longer dominated by nation-states alone. We have moved into a non-state, net-state era.

Why “net-states”? Because the world is no longer neatly divided into states (countries like the US, France, and India) and non-states (terrorist organizations like ISIS and al Qaeda). Ever since Barbara Ehrenreich’s 2011 article “Coming to a Theater Near You: War Without Humans” described the “emergence of a new kind of enemy, so-called non-state actors,” the term transformed into a fancy way of saying “bad guy.” Now we need new language to describe the non-state, non-bad-guys. I propose “net-states.”

Net-states are digital non-state actors, without the violence. Like nation-states, they’re a wildly diverse bunch. Some are the equivalent to global superpowers: the Googles, the Facebooks, the Twitters. Others are mere gatherings of pranksters, like Lulzsec (whose sole purpose for action is “for the lulz”—the laughs). Others still are paramilitary operations, such as GhostSec, an invite-only cyberarmy specifically created to target ISIS. There are also hacktivist collectives like Anonymous and Wikileaks.

Regardless of their differences in size and raison d’etre, net-states of all stripes share three key qualities: They exist largely online, enjoy international devotees, and advance belief-driven agendas that they pursue separate from, and at times, above, the law.

Take Google, for instance. In 2013, the company launched an anti-censorship initiative called Project Shield, a sort of online safe haven for news sites censored by their national governments. Democratic countries like the US may laud such efforts, but in countries where Project Shield has been deployed across Asia and Africa—where free speech is not necessarily protected—those governments would be well within their rights to see Google’s actions as both disruptive and illegal. While Project Shield may be branded a business practice that generates good PR for the company, it also embodies Google’s fundamental doctrine to bring about positive change in the world. As co-founder Sergey Brin put it in a 2014 interview, “the societal goal is our primary goal.”

Anonymous—the hackers and pranksters most famous for the Operation Chanology protest movement against Scientology—occupies a very different role from Google among net-states. It’s not a business; it’s not even an official, card-carrying membership organization.

But Anonymous, too, dabbles in actions traditionally in the domain of government. For instance, after the terrorist attacks in Paris in November 2015, Anonymous disabled between 5,500 and 20,000 ISIS-backed Twitter accounts within 48 hours. Governments have their own official channels to shut down terrorist social media accounts too, but doing so legally at such a large scale likely generates a tad more paperwork than can be processed in just two days.

It’s worth pausing for a moment to consider the point of all this. With deaths by terrorism steadily rising each year, does placing a new name on our already extant world order do anything to actually make us safer?

I argue that it does, because nation-states need a wake-up call: The world needs net-states in order to defeat the non-states. We’re not beating them on our own. To win information-era wars, countries need to recognize the power of the net-states, not as an ancillary locale of assembly in the cyberspace, but as critical entities wielding the kind of power and influence necessary to go toe-to-toe with non-state actors.

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The world needs net-states, because they occupy the same territory as the non-states: the digital sphere. As such, they understand their norms and tactics far more than a land-war, Cold-War era strategist ever could. Major General Michael K. Nagata, commander of American special operations forces in the Middle East, circled this idea back in 2014, in a leaked confidential conversation about ISIS. He said, “We do not understand the movement, and until we do, we are not going to defeat it. We have not defeated the idea. We do not even understand the idea.”

Failure to understand the idea is part of why the US continues to be stuck in the war on terror. And the US is indeed stuck: Secretary of defense James Mattis confirmed that in June, saying in a briefing to Congress, “We are not winning in Afghanistan,” His commanders have classified the 16 years of war a “stalemate.” And without the net-states, the war will likely continue to be one.

The US airstrikes acolytes by the thousands as if they were Old World beasts they can hunt to extinction. But deploying traditional military tactics in battles of belief are the equivalent of setting bear traps for ghosts: They’re not going to work. They’re not relying on the wrong weapons; they’re relying on the wrong worldview. And even purportedly innovative tactics, like government-generated counter-terrorism messaging, while logical in theory, relies on the same outdated perspective (see “Think Again Turn Away,” the State Department’s failed attempt at targeting ISIS Twitter accounts with direct rebuttals). It’s like hearing your parents tell you that drugs are bad. What we need are the cool kids to say it. We need the net-states to say it.

So, nation-states, adapt. And don’t just acknowledge net-states; work with them. Incorporate information-era savvy alongside military campaigns. The risk of not doing so is to lose the faith of the people. Worse, failure to adapt to the information age unwittingly nudges the population ever closer to “reject kings and voting”, to instead embrace “rough consensus and running code.” In other words, forget the anointed powers—put your faith in the general approval of the people and whoever’s actually getting things done. Honestly, when faced with the question of who gets the will of the people today, how many of us would really say “the United States” over “Google”?

In sum, the US can’t keep just shooting terrorists; ideas are the gun in this knife fight. And the keepers of ideas—the places people turn to set them free and watch them spread—are the net-states; not the nation-states. Nation-states ignore our non-state, net-state world order at all our peril.

WIRED Opinion publishes pieces written by outside contributors and represents a wide range of viewpoints. Read more opinions here.

‘There’s a lot more there’: Mueller ups the stakes in Trump-Russia inquiry

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Paul Manafort and Rick Gates were indicted on financial charges, but George Papadopoulos was the surprise as the Russia inquiry enveloped the capital

For a moment in court, the mask slipped. Paul Manafort glanced at his lawyer and smirked, like a TV mafia boss with reasons to be confident. It was the look of a man who, after decades of work as a lobbyist for murderous dictators in Africa and Asia, was not about to be rattled by the prospect of house arrest.

But less than a mile away, another man displayed rather less equanimity. Donald Trump woke before dawn on Monday and, instead of heading to the Oval Office, lingered in the White House residence. “Trump clicked on the television and spent the morning playing fuming media critic, legal analyst and crisis communications strategist, according to several people close to him,” the Washington Post reported.

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Saturday Open Thread | Bob Corker Rips Trump for pressuring DOJ

Washington (CNN) Republican Sen. Bob Corker continued his criticism of President Donald Trump on Friday, saying Trump is pressuring the Justice Department to “pursue cases against his adversaries and calling for punishment before trials take place.”

“Like me, most Americans hope that our justice system is independent and free of political interference,” Corker said in a statement Friday afternoon. “President Trump’s pressuring of the Justice Department and FBI to pursue cases against his adversaries and calling for punishment before trials take place are totally inappropriate and not only undermine our justice system but erode the American people’s confidence in our institutions.”

It is the third time in recent weeks Corker has been highly critical of the President. The Tennessee Republican announced in September that he’s not running for re-election.

Republican Sen. Bob Corker blasts Trump for pressuring DOJ: “Totally inappropriate” https://t.co/oDSV3DcZmE https://t.co/bjU6xJC29B

— CNN (@CNN) November 3, 2017

Trump has repeatedly in the past 24 hours criticized the Justice Department, including in a radio interview where the President described himself as “unhappy” with the department. On Friday morning, Trump told reporters that Justice should be investigating Democrats.

Hariri Resigns As Lebanese Prime Minister All The Way From Saudi Arabia, Because Patriotism

I wonder though, did Saad Hariri know he wanted to resign last week – or even two days ago – when he was all over the place announcing plans and grand schemes to increase Beirut’s airport capacity, boost Lebanon’s tourism, work on further bringing Gulf investors back, and the like? Or when he filmed his Hala Bel Khamis video with a bunch of youth? Or did he simply wake up on November 4th, hop on his private jet to Saudi Arabia, probably without paying that extra tax his government imposed on us, and decided that he did not want to be prime minister anymore?

Whether we are going to actually have elections in 2018 becomes up in the air as well. What Hariri resigning also does is entice Lebanon’s Sunnism, further fueling their sense of being at the short end of the Lebanese stick, threatened merely for existing. Sectarianism is in full blown play, months before we head to the polls – if we do in the first place.

With threats of war, conflict, instability, the Lebanese population deserve

Nothing says patriotism and Lebanese sovereignty as much as your own prime minister announcing his resignation, and subsequently a nail in the coffin of Lebanese governance, all the way from a foreign country, on one of their megaphone TVs nonetheless.

Saad Hariri, who has been back as prime minister for nearly 11 months now, in a government that was billed as one of “national unity” suddenly remembered that – gasp – he is sharing his rule with Hezbollah, a party whom Hariri’s funders in Saudi Arabia do not approve of and whose entire existence is, as we’ve come to know, is mutually exclusive with Hariri’s raison d’etre.

Entre nous, I had totally forgotten up until this very moment that Hariri was prime minister and that Lebanon actually had a government. It’s not that difficult to forget such details when things have been pretty much the same, whether Hariri is there or not, and whether we have a government or not. Corruption is still omnipresent. Dysfunction still reigns supreme. And countries that are not Lebanese still dictate what goes on in our own home country. Their accomplishment? Burdening us with extra taxes and then leaving.

Case in point? Hariri resigned from Saudi Arabia, not even from our Serail, in protest of Iranian influence into Lebanon’s governance.

Hariri’s reasoning for his resignation – clearly dictated on him by his bosses abroad – are that the current situation in Lebanon is similar to the ambiance before the assassination of his father around 12 years ago, along with the threat that Hezbollah’s arms pose on an internal level after their escapades with the dictator in Damascus over the past few years.

Reasonable, perhaps, but it’s mostly a little too late, and exceedingly cowardly for a politician to leave the entire country in the dust as he rushes away to save his own ass, all other Lebanese be damned. Yet again, what can we expect from a ruling class whose priority was and will always be its own skin, and whose MO for ruling is to benefit as much as possible from being in power, with servicing us as Lebanese citizens being the last thing on their minds?

I wonder though, did Saad Hariri know he wanted to resign last week – or even two days ago – when he was all over the place announcing plans and grand schemes to increase Beirut’s airport capacity, boost Lebanon’s tourism, work on further bringing Gulf investors back, and the like? Or when he filmed his Hala Bel Khamis video with a bunch of youth? Or did he simply wake up on November 4th, hop on his private jet to Saudi Arabia, probably without paying that extra tax his government imposed on us, and decided that he did not want to be prime minister anymore?

Whether we are going to actually have elections in 2018 becomes up in the air as well. What Hariri resigning also does is entice Lebanon’s Sunnism, further fueling their sense of being at the short end of the Lebanese stick, threatened merely for existing. Sectarianism is in full blown play, months before we head to the polls – if we do in the first place.

With threats of war, conflict, instability, the Lebanese population deserves more than politicians who are willing to throw it under the bus on whimsical dictated moves. We deserve more than to wake up one day and realize we don’t have a government anymore, and that our security and well-being is even more up in the air just because a politician’s foreign bosses told him so.

Filed under: Lebanon Tagged: Government, Lebanon, Prime Minister, Resignation, Saad Hariri