Podcast Summary: How AI Is Helping – and Harming – Animals
London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE): Public Lectures and Events
Date: September 30, 2025
Main Theme:
A provocative panel explores how artificial intelligence (AI) is both advancing and threatening animal welfare, coinciding with the launch of the Jeremy Coller Centre for Animal Sentience at LSE. The episode brings together philosophers, scientists, technologists, and activists to dissect AI’s impact on animal sentience, ethics, and policy, highlighting new research and ongoing dilemmas.
1. Setting the Stage: Launch of the Jeremy Coller Centre for Animal Sentience
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[00:17] Roman Frigg (Chair, LSE Philosophy Department):
- Explains the interdisciplinary mission of the new centre, rooted in LSE’s tradition of socially relevant philosophy.
- Frames animal sentience as an intersectional challenge—scientific, philosophical, and normative.
- Emphasizes philosophy’s role in critically engaging with sciences to shape the future of animal welfare and rights.
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[03:22] Larry Kramer (President, LSE):
- Describes the centre’s founding as a response to urgent global issues: factory farming, biodiversity loss, climate change, effective altruism, and debates over legal personhood.
- Highlights LSE’s mission: “to know the causes of things for the betterment of society.”
- Credits Professor Jonathan Birch’s research for major policy shifts, including the inclusion of octopuses, lobsters, and crabs in UK welfare law.
- Announces Jeremy Coller’s foundational gift and presents the symbolic “Fabian Window” as recognition.
“The mission of LSE...is to know the causes of things for the betterment of society. And we take both halves of that mission seriously.”
— Larry Kramer [04:22]
2. Jeremy Coller: Personal Motivation & Activism
- [10:40] Jeremy Coller (Philanthropist):
- Shares his journey from “failed philosophy student” and young vegetarian to outspoken animal rights activist.
- Critiques historic and ongoing speciesism, referencing Descartes and Malebranche's denial of animal sentience.
- Describes his transformation from “bystander to upstander” in 2013.
- Lists major initiatives:
- FAIRR (Farm Animal Investment Risk and Return)
- Coller Animal Law Forum
- The Coller Doolittle Prize—an AI-powered quest for two-way interspecies communication.
- Praises Professor Birch for merging philosophical rigor with impact, influencing both UK and Californian legislation.
“Bad things happen when good people do nothing. So I decided to move from being a bystander to being an upstander by becoming an animal rights activist.”
— Jeremy Coller [12:38]
“The reason why I wanted to do the Coller Doolittle Prize is… like the Rosetta Stone unlocked hieroglyphics, I want to ask a cow how she feels when her calf is taken away.”
— Jeremy Coller [15:21]
3. Professor Jonathan Birch: The Centre’s Vision & Initial Priorities
- [19:53] Jonathan Birch (Director, Centre for Animal Sentience):
- Connects the LSE’s reformist ethos with animal welfare, lamenting stalled progress and entrenched cruelty in industrial farming.
- Outlines the centre’s “ethical moonshots”—ambitious research and advocacy for:
- Harnessing AI for animal welfare, not harm
- Examines both positive potential and emerging risks from AI in animal care, farm automation, and communication research.
- Stresses need for urgent regulatory frameworks.
- Inclusion and respect for all sentient beings
- Pushes to extend legal and practical protections to neglected species, especially aquatic life.
- Discusses recent victories (e.g., bans on octopus farming), but notes these are "a drop in the ocean."
- Bridging the value-action gap in human–animal relations
- Investigates cognitive dissonance between professed animal friendliness and widespread cruelty.
- Plans experiments on how pet food choices and information campaigns can shift true behavior.
- Harnessing AI for animal welfare, not harm
“AI is already having huge impacts on other species, yet they’re often forgotten completely in discussions of AI governance, ethics and safety. That has to change.”
— Jonathan Birch [22:33]
“Some might say this is an impossible dream, but that boundary between the possible and the allegedly impossible is one that we aim to move.”
— Jonathan Birch [30:47]
4. Panel Discussion: AI’s Role with Animals—Hope and Hazard
4.1. Earth Species Project: Decoding Animal Communication
- [32:27] Jane Lawton (Earth Species Project):
- Describes efforts to build language models (e.g., Nature LM Audio) to analyze and interpret animal vocalizations across species.
- Stresses the organization's ethical mission: understanding is a step toward empathy, conservation, and welfare.
“Communication is a really important window into the intelligences and lives of other creatures. If we can understand them better, we relate to them better.”
— Jane Lawton [35:55]
- [36:20] Cautions Against Risks:
- Warns that technology can be intrusive.
- Calls for regulatory frameworks to ensure technology is used for good, not exploitation.
4.2. Moral Status and Social Change
- [36:32] Kristin Andrews (City University of New York):
- Argues that genuine human-animal communication implies recognizing animals as agents with their own moral standing—a societal leap we may not be ready for.
“As soon as you have a conversation, you are implicitly acknowledging that moral status.”
— Kristin Andrews [36:41]
- [39:47] Research Example:
- Discusses projects using AI and drones to study social dynamics of wild animals (e.g., street dogs, tigers in India), seeking non-intrusive means to learn from animal societies.
4.3. Precision Livestock Farming: Automation and Surveillance
- [42:18] Jeff Sebo (New York University):
- Outlines use of AI in massive factory farms for “precision livestock farming”—monitoring health, feeding, and environment at scale for billions of animals.
- Draws attention to both potential for improved welfare (e.g., earlier illness detection) and massive risks:
- Further industrialization
- Creating surveillance systems that entrench, rather than minimize, suffering
- Potential for reinforcing the legitimacy of intensive farming
“Unless this industry is regulated... it will optimize for productivity and efficiency, not animal welfare.”
— Jeff Sebo [46:46]
4.4. Veterinary AI: Hope for Companion Animals—But with Caveats
- [49:23] Leonie Bossert (University of Vienna):
- Veterinary AI could benefit companion animals (e.g., earlier cancer diagnostics).
- Ethical concerns: data quality, over-reliance, loss of human–animal care, lack of regulatory scrutiny compared to human medicine.
“What tasks of care do we want to outsource to AI systems, especially in existential contexts like duration of living and health?”
— Leonie Bossert [52:26]
4.5. Replacing Animals in Research
- [56:37] Jonathan Birch:
- Suggests AI could be used to replace animal models in scientific research, but this raises new questions about the limits of understanding without direct relationship or consent.
5. Audience Q&A: Ethical Quandaries and Future Directions
Key Concerns Raised:
- Anthropomorphism vs. Anthropodenial:
- Over-interpreting animal communication through a human lens can both enable continued exploitation or, conversely, deny animals moral standing.
- Need for humility and better interpretative frameworks.
“There could also be a risk of reinforcing anthropodenial... leading us to see them as lesser than because we are still applying a human standard.”
— Jeff Sebo [65:57]
- Big Tech and Commercial Interests:
- Most AI is developed by a handful of dominant commercial labs, often disconnected from animal welfare priorities.
- Researchers are pressing for “AI alignment” to weight animal welfare in these models, but progress is slow and resistance high.
“Can you get something added to [AI's] constitution... that maximizes animal welfare? That’s proved really, really hard to get.”
— Jonathan Birch [68:10]
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Capitalism and Exploitation:
- Real risks that translation and monitoring technologies will be used not for animals’ benefit but to further exploit them, e.g., manipulating migration patterns, maximizing productivity.
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Regulation, Data Ethics, and Trivialization:
- Strong call for new, urgent ethical frameworks—especially for field research and “playback” experiments using generative AI.
- Cautions about the risk of trivializing animal communication (e.g., through consumer pet translation apps).
“If the first thing that happens is an app on your phone so you can talk to your cat or dog, that is not going to lead us anywhere near the transformation we’re looking for.”
— Jane Lawton [70:49]
- Limits of Translation and Understanding:
- AI can deepen understanding, but not all animal cognition, communication, or preference can be rendered understandable to humans.
- True “ground truth” often inaccessible; relationships matter.
“What I think we’re aiming for is a better understanding... and potentially also needing to appreciate the mystery and the beauty in the mystery of the overlaps...”
— Jane Lawton [77:32]
Short Memorable Exchanges:
- “Do you believe that animals have egos?” — Audience member [73:20]
- “If we want to understand animals and have relationships with them, we’re not going to be able to substitute AI for the animals.”
— Kristin Andrews [57:26] - “We need regulatory frameworks to get ahead of [the misuse of AI].”
— Jane Lawton [70:10]
6. Concluding Reflections
- Technological Optimism vs. Technological Caution:
- AI presents “moonshot” hopes—decoding animal communication, improving welfare—but progress is double-edged. Without social, ethical, and regulatory inputs, technology may reinforce harm.
- Interdisciplinary, critical, and practical research—grounded in real-world challenges and ambitious about change—is needed to shape the future for animals and humans alike.
Final Quote:
“We want to change the way humans relate to the rest of the natural world… that boundary between the possible and the allegedly impossible is one that we aim to move.”
— Jonathan Birch [30:40]
Key Timestamps for Reference
- [00:17] Chair’s Introduction (Roman Frigg)
- [03:22] LSE President’s Opening and Centre’s Purpose (Larry Kramer)
- [10:40] Jeremy Coller’s Reflections and Motivations
- [19:53] Professor Jonathan Birch: Centre’s Vision and Priorities
- [32:27] Earth Species Project: Decoding Communication (Jane Lawton)
- [42:18] Precision Livestock Farming: Pros and Cons (Jeff Sebo)
- [49:23] Veterinary AI Ethics (Leonie Bossert)
- [65:53] Audience Q&A Addressing Anthropomorphism, Big Tech, Capitalism, and Research Ethics
- [70:49] Panel Wrap-Up: Risks, Hopes, and the Need for Transformation
Tone: Serious, intellectually lively, critical yet hopeful.
For Listeners: This episode offers a thorough, nuanced exploration of where technology and animal welfare intersect. It doesn’t shy away from hard truths but encourages optimism—provided society also reflects on values, ethics, and regulation as AI continues to transform our world and our relationship with other sentient beings.