For the most part, my observations of animals have given me the impression that, in general: they want to live, and they fear death

and these drives are so predominant that, if given the choice, in a setting where their animal minds can clearly gauge which options would pose the most severe danger of death? they will frequently choose options that boost the chance of even slightly longer survival, at the expense of considerable pain and injury

and therefore, in most cases, I tend to think that humans are often over-eager to make assumptions about what sort of life would be “worse than death” for other animal species

and that we tend to structure our ideas of “humane” animal treatment, including mercy killing, around assumptions that animals themselves, if they could understand, would probably disagree with

However

I recently learned about “peace silk,” a process of making silk that does not kill the silkworms in their cocoons, and allows them to hatch and experience their short adult phase as a moth after pupation

and… while I agree that this comes from kindhearted intentions, and there was a time when I would have considered it more humane than the normal method…

I have to say, at my current level of experience observing moths?

they are an exception

I have never ONCE met an adult moth of any species that had even the most rudimentary HINT of any sort of self-preservation instinct.

trying to keep a fucking moth alive for even five damn minutes is in DIRECT CONFLICT with the moth’s most deeply held desires, and you can’t convince me otherwise