How Debates Around AI Reveal a Double Standard in Our Treatment of Animals

Human cruelty to other animal species takes many forms. Keeping pigs in tiny gestation crates, forcing cows to give birth only to quickly rip their calves away from them, and factory farming octopuses are a few examples of this cruelty. Often, humans attempt to explain away this casual, entrenched cruelty by calling other animals “stupid”, or lauding humans’ perceived “higher intelligence”. However, the creation of Artificial Intelligence, or AI, is causing some to point out the hypocrisy of this reasoning. 

Although animal intelligence is often measured against a human yardstick, the reality is that animals experience the world in a variety of ways that differ vastly. For this reason, their intelligence cannot be measured in human terms. Nevertheless, non-human animals are sentient beings capable of feeling love, pain, fear, and other emotions. This fact is often ignored in humanity’s search for a reflection of themselves. However, even if animals are measured against human scales, there are many recognizable markers of their sentience. Chickens will protect their young, sheltering them under their wings and defending them against threats. Octopus can use tools, and figure out how to escape confinement. Cows even have best friends. 

Although humans defend the exploitation of other animals for their benefit, the hypocrisy of their arguments is revealed when considering the implications of the spread of AI. The spread of Artificial Intelligence threatens one of the principles humans have long used to justify the subjugation of other animal species, our supposed “higher intelligence”. As the power and scope of AI grows, it remains to be seen whether we will one day be perceived as “intelligent”, or relegated to the role we now force other animals to fill. 

Sentience is often used to separate human intelligence from artificial intelligence. However, other animals have demonstrated time and time again that they too are sentient, complex beings. Whether or not AI will one day develop sentience, or wield that sentience against humanity remains up for debate. Ultimately, humanity’s treatment of other animals versus arguments about what separates us from Artificial Intelligence reveals the horrifying double standards that exist around the humane treatment of other animals. 

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Ahimsa by Tiny Rescue: Animal Collection

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