Jeff Sebo (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), “Animals and Climate Change”
Channel: Radio-CRÉ
Date: 2017-11-03

“Animals and Climate Change”

I argue that animals are central to climate change, since farmed animals are a leading cause of climate change and climate change will be a leading cause of wild animal suffering. In this talk I defend these claims and examine their implications. I start by arguing that industrial animal agriculture is responsible for 18-51% of global GHG emissions, and therefore we need to center abolition of industrial animal agriculture in our efforts to mitigate climate change. I then argue that climate change will have a pervasive impact on wild animal populations, and therefore we need to center consideration of wild animals in our efforts to adapt to climate change. I close by discussing the issues in science and philosophy that we need to address to make further progress on these issues.