Decades of research have established that commonly farmed animals are sentient beings with complex emotional and cognitive lives deserving moral consideration.
The scientific consensus on farm animal sentience has outpaced the legal protections afforded to farmed animals in most countries. Despite evidence of complex emotions including joy, fear, grief, and anticipatory states, production systems routinely cause suffering that would be illegal if inflicted on companion animals. Closing the gap between what science knows and what the law requires is one of the central challenges in animal welfare advocacy.