India is home to more people with malnutrition than Sub-Saharan Africa; one in 3 of the world's malnourished children live in India (source: UNICEF).

Now India's ruling party is introducing a national food security bill which would effectively provide a right to food for >60 per cent of its 1.1 billion people. All children up to 14 would get fed a hot midday meal at school. Half of all urban dwellers and 3/4 of rural dwellers would get a right to around 7 kgs of grain per person, per month. Many questions remain about how it would be funded.

If reports are accurate, and it passes into law, and it is properly implemented (all huge ifs) this could surely reduce human suffering on an enormous scale. In large part it avoids the poor meat-eater problem due to Hindu vegetarianism (though dairy consumption would likely spike, and meat-eating among millions of poor Muslims).

What are the other utilitarian downsides? Are there any?

spindoctor wrote:What are the other utilitarian downsides? Are there any?

The meat-eating by non-Hindus is unfortunate. Especially Halal meat, which is widely condemned by animal-welfare groups.

As far as the grain (rice?) food, you already pointed out concerns about the frogs and other wild animals killed thereby.

The other big factor here is what the reduced hunger will imply for the future of humanity. Improved nutrition will lead to increased intelligence. Less hungry people might be more productive in terms of self-education and scientific advancements. Of course, the sign of this impact isn't obvious, not just because I don't know if existential risk is good or bad but also because I don't even know if improved intelligence increases or decreases existential risk.

I suppose if there's a civilization that I would like to gain proportionate power in the post-human future, India isn't a bad candidate on account of historic animal concern. That said, Indians seem to care more about cows than chickens , and I don't know how strong their utilitarian inclinations are compared with the West. At least Hindus don't support eternal torture for unbelievers....

Alan Dawrst wrote:India isn't a bad candidate on account of historic animal concern.

India's "historic animal concern" includes not eating meat, but it doesn't include supporting post-human interventions to reduce wild-animal suffering. I conjecture (without strong evidence) that most Hindus would want to keep nature as it is and that they wouldn't oppose directed panspermia. (I'm not sure what Buddhists would have to say on the matter of spreading suffering life into space, though.)

Are they particularly different from the West in that respect? Both societies have a tendency toward collective superstition/status quo bias. It's not as though the UK or US are clamouring en masse to reduce wild-animal suffering.

Another possible side effect, is that if the preponderance of Hinduism makes vegetarian food semi-standard, it might filter through to the rest of the world in the form of food exports (either physical or as recipes).

Arepo wrote:Are they particularly different from the West in that respect? Both societies have a tendency toward collective superstition/status quo bias. It's not as though the UK or US are clamouring en masse to reduce wild-animal suffering.

Do you know of any non-Western Indians who are utilitarians or transhumanists? I can't think of any off the top of my head, but I'm also much less familiar with Indian scholarship than with Western.

I don't wish to imply that the scholars need to use the label "utilitarian" or "transhumanist" to describe themselves, but only that they would support the right sorts of policies, e.g., expected-value maximization, re-engineering nature, utilitronium, etc.

No, but as you say I know no non-Western Indians at all. To be honest I have no idea what their popular value systems are - they recently relaxed the laws prohibiting gay sex, but I don't remember reading anything about what the justification was.

Arepo wrote:To be honest I have no idea what their popular value systems are

Kind of interesting, isn't it? I know hundreds of Western intellectuals, but just a handful of Indian ones, and even then only those who speak to Western audiences. I wonder why there aren't more speeches that Indians give to Indians translated for the West. And most of what I learned in school was about Indian history or religion, not about contemporary academic ideas. It would be like someone trying to understand the US by learning about Christianity and the Civil War.

Alan Dawrst wrote:

Arepo wrote:To be honest I have no idea what their popular value systems are

Kind of interesting, isn't it? I know hundreds of Western intellectuals, but just a handful of Indian ones, and even then only those who speak to Western audiences. I wonder why there aren't more speeches that Indians give to Indians translated for the West. And most of what I learned in school was about Indian history or religion, not about contemporary academic ideas. It would be like someone trying to understand the US by learning about Christianity and the Civil War.

Hey Alan,
I am not aware of a good explanation, but here's my attempt. When I think of my experiences with learning about other cultures from school - I can't think of any that were not introduced through historic facts about wars they had; all this may be because in the way much of the US school curriculum is structured. I was thinking about texts or speeches that are translated into English, and I can't think of ideas from any country / culture which has any popularity within the US; this again may be a feature of the US culture (people think they are #1 so others are ignored).
Sorry for the lack of clarity in what I say, but I hope you get what I mean.