Dietary Choices: A Multi-objective Optimisation Problem

Note: This post is written in a personal capacity. The views expressed here are my own and do not represent those of any organisation I’m affiliated with. I'm grateful to Elizabeth Crewe, Melanie Joy, Tobias Leenaert, and Felix Werdermann for their valuable input and feedback, which does not imply endorsement of the views presented. The footnotes provide additional context, clarify assumptions, and offer illustrative examples where helpful. In this post, I explore how we can think more systematically about our dietary choices by making the underlying assumptions and trade-offs explicit. My aim is not to promote a particular diet, but to provide a framework that helps people make choices that align with their own worldviews and individual circumstances, and that also helps identify the sources of disagreement about those choices. A Framework for Evaluating Dietary Trade-offs Conceptual Foundations Our dietary choices have profound consequences on both our own lives and the world around us. At the same time, the question of which diet is “best” has no simple answer. Every diet involves trade-offs between competing objectives, and our conclusions about which diet is preferable depend on our normative and empirical assumptions: Normative : Which objectives should we care about, and how should they be weighted? Empirical : How well do different diets achieve those objectives, given the available evidence and our individual circumstances? For example, how much personal sacrifice w…