> Think of a problem that we saw coming in the future and we collectively solved. I can think of none.
My favorite counterexample is the ozone layer. When I was a kid, that was the Big Bad environmental concern. But we actually worked together on a global scale to fix it.
Broader climate change is a much bigger problem with stronger financial and political incentives, but in principle we've done it before.
I dislike Sea Shepherd as an organization, due to their distasteful methods (and personal bias, being a Faroese resident). But I spoke with several of their volunteers during one of their campaigns, and was pleased to realize that, as individuals, their hearts are mostly in the right place. Nearly all of them claimed to be vegan, which I feel does give you legitimate ethical grounds from which to criticize grindadráp.
However, if you don't oppose the general consumption of meat, I don't find the argument against grindadráp compelling. It yields more meat per killed animal than most, and the slaughter itself is arguably no less humane than most commercial meat production (not a high bar, I admit).
In terms of publicity, grindadráp suffers from being inherently more visible than commercial meat production. Personally, I think this is a positive thing. It confronts you with the fact that meat doesn't magically appear in a supermarket freezer - if you want to eat meat, then by definition a living animal has to die. The visibility of grindadráp has prompted conversations with my young son about where meat comes from, and the animal welfare consequences of eating it.
Most animals these days are killed as efficiently as possible - a quick stun for chickens, a bolt through the skull for cows, etc.
The problem with commercial meat production is pretty much always the mega-farms that have them in horrible conditions during life. It's just cheaper, easier, and results in tastier meat to quickly perform the slaughter.
Note that "religious meat" can be cruel for certain animals as well. Chickens are still a quick stun, IIRC, but cows are brutalized - they basically slowly drown in their own blood, because of the way they are slaughtered to be Halal.
And then companies try to push for more Halal meat, because there are fewer rules to account for, when it comes to Halal (great way for them to skirt the law, legally). The chicken supposedly tastes better, though.
The only reason it tastes better is because its not factory farm sourced in the same way and youre closer to the slaughter date when consuming it. Massive suppliers control the entire chain including slaughter. Halal suppliers or live chicken suppliers tend to be smaller operations.
Handling nitrogen is more dangerous than CO2 for the same reason it is more humane for the animals; you don’t notice you’re being asphyxiated. Not that it is impossible or even particularly difficult to handle nitrogen safely, but it would incur a cost (training, equipment, ...), and inevitably result in accidents when these costs are skimped on.
Unless legislation changes, it's simply better business to let the animals suffer.
I feel the same way. I've hiked a few times at one of the locations in these photos with my 8 year old son (under close supervision). I think it's a great way to build a sense of responsibility and humility.
Unfortunately, that also makes it inherently more dangerous. Just a month ago, three tourists went missing at that location. [1]
Apropos mixing bitterants, it's quite common to apply a bitter nail varnish to help people stop biting their nails. Not an addictive substance, but an addictive behavior.
I agree you shouldn't use LLMs to produce material wholesale, but I think it can be positively useful when used thoughtfully.
I recently taught a high school equivalent philosophy class, and wanted to design an exercise for my students to allocate a limited number of organs to recipients that were not directly comparable. I asked an LLM to generate recipient profiles for the students to choose between. First pass, the recipients all needed different organs, which kind of ruined the point of the dilemma! I told it so, and second pass was great.
Even with the extra handholding, the LLM made good materials faster than if I would have designed them manually. But if I had trusted it blindly, the materials would have been useless.
How can you ensure that the exercise actually teaches the students anything in this case? Shouldn't you be building the exercise around the kinds of issues that are likely to come up, or that are difficult/interesting?
If you're teaching ethics in high school (which it sounds like you are), how many minutes does it take to write three or four paragraphs, one per case, highlighting different aspects that the student would need to take into account when making ethical decisions? I would estimate five to ten. A random assortment of cases from an LLM is unlikely to support the ethical themes you've talked about in the rest of the class, and the students are therefore also unlikely to be able to apply anything they've learned in class before then.
This may sound harsh, but to me it sounds like you've created a non-didactic, busywork exercise.
> How can you ensure that the exercise actually teaches the students anything in this case?
By participating in the exercise during class. Introducing the cases, facilitating group discussions, and providing academic input when bringing the class back together for a review. I'm not just saying "hey take a look at this or whatever".
> If you're teaching ethics in high school (which it sounds like you are)
Briefly and temporarily. I have no formal pedagogic background. Input appreciated.
> This may sound harsh, but to me it sounds like you've created a non-didactic, busywork exercise.
I may not have elaborated well enough on the context. I'm not creating slop in order to avoid doing work. I'm using the tools available to do more work faster - and sometimes coming across examples or cases that I realized I wouldn't have thought of myself. And, crucially, strictly supervising any and all work that the LLM produces.
If I had infinite time, then I'd happily spend it on meticulously handcrafting materials. But as this thread makes clear, that's a rare luxury in education.
My favorite counterexample is the ozone layer. When I was a kid, that was the Big Bad environmental concern. But we actually worked together on a global scale to fix it.
Broader climate change is a much bigger problem with stronger financial and political incentives, but in principle we've done it before.