It's not like anything to be a bat

A clever anthropic argument about animal consciousness. Nagel asked what it's like to be a bat (exotic qualia we can't imagine); Scott applies Doomsday-style anthropic reasoning instead. Given vastly more animals than humans (the Buddhist parable of rare human rebirth), the prior probability of finding yourself human is vanishingly small — so if you COULD be an animal, you probably would be; the fact that you're human is then an anthropic argument that it's impossible to be an animal, which would follow neatly if animals lack subjective experience (you can't be an animal any more than a toaster). Nagel can relax; eat veal guilt-free. Scott flags how weird this is (a qualitative, discontinuous gap between animal and human nervous systems; comfort for dualists) and the main objection (maybe what matters is self-identifying as conscious, which only humans/apes/dolphins do — but why not use the conscious-beings reference class?), and admits he doesn't fully accept it, inviting a better refutation.

Quality 72 · Strong. Strong-ish — a genuinely original, thought-provoking argument applying anthropic reasoning to the qualia question (anthropics + Nagel + the Buddhist parable), idea-dense for 668 words. Held at low-Strong because it is short, speculative, and explicitly hedged (Scott doesn't endorse the conclusion).

Claude’s paradigm shift 48 · Moderate. Notable — turning the Doomsday/anthropic argument onto animal consciousness is a fresh, surprising 2009 move.

Real-world impact 1 · Negligible. A genuinely original, idea-dense anthropic argument about animal consciousness (given vastly more animals than humans, being human is evidence it's impossible to be an animal — i.e. animals lack subjective experience). Conceptual influence within rationalist discourse, short and explicitly hedged, no material change — minimal RWI.